


Corruption

by ultharkitty



Series: Attachment [2]
Category: Transformers Generation One
Genre: Dark, M/M, Non-Sticky Sexual Interfacing, Sticky Sexual Interfacing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-09-29
Updated: 2012-09-29
Packaged: 2017-11-15 07:01:08
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 27,088
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/524467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ultharkitty/pseuds/ultharkitty
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This fic was written for robotbigbang, and comes with a whole gallery of wonderful illustrations by casusfere. <a href="http://casusfere.livejournal.com/21212.html">Click here for the art!</a>  <3</p><p> </p><p><b>Summary:</b> The war is over; Rodimus is dead and the Decepticons hold Cybertron. First Aid has been living under Vortex's protection for a year, masquerading as a drone to ensure his own safety. Then a newcomer challenges Vortex's hold over the medic, and everything threatens to change.</p><p><b>Contains:</b> sticky and non-sticky, consent issues, very dark. Aside from that, I've chosen not to warn. If you'd like a full list of the content advice, just let me know. </p><p><b>Notes:</b> Massive thanks to my wonderful beta naboru, to spacehussy, xianghua and ayngelcat for their encouragement, input and tolerance of my need to moan about this at great length, and to  causufere for her work in illustrating this monster <3</p>
            </blockquote>





	Corruption

_Autobot Chief Medical Officer, First Aid  
Journal recording 037_

Today is the anniversary of Defensor's death.

I still hear him when the lights are off and Vortex is in recharge. Fragments of thought, a snatch of his voice. Hallucinations - auditory and otherwise. I remember what it was to be him, and there's parts of me that ache, parts that won't ever be used again. 

Maybe that's why I picked up this data crystal after so long. It's been months since my last recording; I need to talk things through. 

I miss Defensor. I miss them all. Hot Spot, Streetwise, Groove... Blades. Oh Blades. 

I need to stop shivering. Vortex will wake, he'll want to know what's wrong. I'll tell him, and he'll get that look on his face, that impatience. Disappointment. We've been over this before. Blades is dead. Blades is a drone. Blades is outside in the hallway, guarding the door to the Combaticon intelligence compound because if anyone saw me for what I really am they would take me away and execute me. 

We don't want that, either of us. 

Blades wouldn't want that.

I'm still shivering, and Vortex is stirring. I try to control my ventilation. I'm using sub-voc commands to write this to my recorder. I really don't want him to wake up. This is my time, time to think. Time to remember.

Our anniversary. One whole Earth year. 

I can't stop thinking in Earth terms. But we're not on Earth. I can see most of Kaon from here, through the wide strip window; the foundries, the factories, the sparks and the smoke. An endless cycle of creation. 

Vortex is murmuring. He talks in his sleep, says things in an old pre-war dialect I can't even begin to understand. He's trying to teach me, because requisitioning the language files would be too dangerous, but he's not the best of instructors. 

I should try to recharge. Onslaught's coming back tomorrow. Blast Off will need a post-flight service. I don't know if Brawl will be with them; even if he isn't I'll be busy. There won't be time to mourn. 

* * *

Obedience, Vortex mused, was most satisfying when it was learned and not programmed. 

It was the difference between his drone and his captive. 

The drone's software only went so far. It could bend over for him, or bend him over; it could smile and simper and slam him into the wall and tear off his covers. It could tell him all the platitudes its engineers had provided it with. But it couldn't convince itself that it wanted him. It couldn't lie shivering the whole night through, anguished and beautiful, and try so very hard not to wake him up. It couldn't fight its own grief to respond to his touch, or kiss him with that degree of needy desperation when it would far rather be lying quietly, lost in thought. 

Vortex stretched, and leaned over his captive. "Open for me."

First Aid sighed beneath him, legs parting, covers drawing back. Entering him never got old. Physically, it was like breaking in a new-build every time, he kept himself so well. But psychologically? The mech knew what he wanted, even if he didn't always know how to get it.

And he knew how to give. Hot scrap, he knew where to put his hands, and how to roll his hips, and exactly how tight he could squeeze to hold them both on the brink. 

He was utterly selfless. It was part of his charm. 

It certainly made him easier to control.

* * *

_Journal recording 038_

They're fighting again. 

They've been at it for almost an hour. I'm in the medical supply closet, they're in med-bay. I went in for a spare ventilation filter, and that's when it started. I wish they'd stop. I don't understand how they can live like this. All they do is argue, and the smallest things set them off. 

This time it was Blast Off. He made a disparaging remark to Brawl. I won't repeat it. Brawl began yelling, and Swindle started trying to talk over them. Then Onslaught came in to break them up, but didn't, and scrap I wish Vortex was as kind and level headed around them as he is around me. All they need is a little compassion and understanding, but I can hear him goading them. He just makes things worse. 

I should go out there. I want to. No, that's a lie. I don't want to, but I feel obligated. This is my home now, these are my protectors. 

They all know who I am, _what_ I am. After Vortex took me in... Swindle saw me, caught us interfacing. I... I'm still ashamed of that. We tried to convince him I was a drone, like... Like Blades. He pretended to go along with it. He was looking for the right opportunity to blackmail Vortex. 

It never came. 

Onslaught found me before Swindle had a chance. 

"Like the new drone?" Vortex asked him. He was leaning against the door to his private room, and I was standing there like we hadn't just been intimate, trying to stop the heat rolling off me. 

I'll never forget Onslaught's response. He cocked his head to one side, said, "Do you think I'm stupid?" and punched Vortex through the wall.

I couldn't help it, I got between them. I was sure I was headed for the smelter, but I was equally sure Onslaught wasn't done. I can't countenance that kind of violence, especially not from a commander to his subordinate, let alone within a gestalt. I had to try something. 

Onslaught stared for a long moment, then he laughed at me. But at least he lowered his fist. 

It took two cycles for the forms to be filled in, submitted and approved by whatever bureaucracy now exists on Cybertron. Onslaught went along with the charade, he signed his glyph to the lie. I was classified non-sentient, and the Combaticons claimed me as a spoil of war. 

My self-awareness is our secret, the six of us. I don't count Bruticus, I'm not sure he understands. 

As I listen to them hurl insults, my gears wound so tight I squeak if I move, I have trouble believing they could keep anything quiet for long. 

But they can. They do. They brought me supplies – stolen, bought or scavenged, I don't know. They fixed up this room for me. For them, really. Onslaught made me an offer the day he discovered me: maintain them, repair them, be their personal medic, and they'd keep me safe and fuelled. 

I remember looking to Vortex, trying to work out how he felt about it. He just nodded, the dents in his battle mask catching the light. 

They've kept their promises. Even Brawl won't talk about me, although he does talk _to_ me. Sometimes. He only seems to get into the rhythm of speaking when he's shouting. 

Like now. 

I should go out there, but I'm afraid, and I'm ashamed that I'm afraid. But I can hear Blast Off's cannons start to whine, and Brawl is stamping his foot, and Onslaught has that edge to his voice. 

I should try not to grip my knees so tight, Vortex doesn't like to see me dented. 

I really _really_ wish they'd stop.

* * *

Vortex gave his prize just over a joor before he went to the storage closet. It was enough time to find him shivering in the corner, knees tucked under his chin and arms wound tight around them. In med-bay, Onslaught had his hands full, one massive fist wrapped around Swindle's head and one around Brawl's, holding them apart. Blast Off's cannons were primed, although Vortex didn't think he'd use them. Shame, it was always entertaining when he discharged his weapons indoors. 

"Look at you," Vortex said softly. "You'll hurt yourself if you're not careful. You don't want that, do you?" 

First Aid acknowledged him with a quiet crackling reset of his vocaliser, but he stayed where he was. He only moved when Vortex crouched beside him and scooped him up. He was shaking, tense; when he uncurled his gears creaked. 

Vortex ran a tremor through his energy field, worry and reassurance. With a pathetic little cry, First Aid latched onto his shoulders and buried his face in Vortex's neck.

"Let's get you outta here," Vortex said. No reprimand for his mental instability, no subtle dig at his weakness. Better to encourage it, lead First Aid to believe that Vortex was the source of all solace, help the medic to forget how self-sufficient he could be. 

First Aid froze when Vortex carried them through med-bay. No-one paused to watch. Swindle was now free, wagging a finger at Onslaught, lecturing. Brawl struggled, throwing punches and yelling accusations at the end of Onslaught's long reach, but they were aimed at Blast Off now, rather than Swindle. The shuttle was not impressed. 

It was the same old story, entertaining in its own way. But unless Vortex was the focus, it couldn't compete with the strength of his captive's grip, the warmth of him. Vortex carried him through their small makeshift med-bay, back towards intel. 

First Aid took a while to relax. Vortex shifted his grip, freed a hand to stroke the seam near the back of First Aid's neck where his hood folded away. That always seemed to soothe him. 

First Aid mumbled something, unheard past the rattling as he shook and the vibration of his voice through Vortex's neck cables. 

"What's that?" It was always gently gently with the Autobot, a technique Vortex hadn't had reason to practice for a long while. He was rather enjoying it. 

"I should be working," First Aid said. His head tilted up, optics wide and earnest. "I need to prep Brawl's new vent filters, and the box of diodes Swindle brought needs checking."

"Later," Vortex said, and it was all First Aid seemed to need. He settled down again, resting his head on Vortex's shoulder. He was used to this, being carried away from conflict, or just from his work. Being interrupted whenever Vortex was bored, or when Vortex thought he needed interrupting.

For the first few orns of his captivity, First Aid hadn't liked to be carried, and had demanded each time to be set down, protesting that he could walk by himself. It hadn't been hard to convince him otherwise, to encourage him to derive comfort from the contact, to want to be held. It was harder, now, getting him to let go.

Not that Vortex wanted him to. If he held his prize for long enough, that nervous energy would channel elsewhere, that need for comfort would transmute into something more physical, more charged. 

But not yet. Shame. Vortex would have liked to have pressed him against the wall and spiked him there and then. 

"I'm not..." First Aid shook his head. No surprise he was so perceptive; it was in his code, to read a mech's body language, to interpret fluctuations in a person's energy field in terms of emotion and intent. And it wasn't as though Vortex made an effort to hide his interest.

"That's OK," Vortex said. Forcing his prize wouldn't do any good. "I've got some reports to fill in, you wanna sit with me?"

The medic's grip tightened; of course he did. It was that or be alone. 

"Do you have a spare datapad?" First Aid asked. "I can update the supply list."

"Always gotta be useful, don't you?" Vortex teased. 

Four floors up in the tower Vortex shared with Blast Off, the Blades drone waited outside the door to the intel compound. First Aid stiffened, his EM field broadcasting grief and longing and a bitter sadness. No anger, though, just the matrix of his loss. 

The drone scanned them, and stepped aside. It didn't turn to watch, or cock its head to the side; its rotors were still, and the only noise it made was the combined hum of its pumps and motors and electrics. Without instruction otherwise, it was mute in body and voice, and Vortex wondered what First Aid made of that. 

The Combaticon intel compound was mostly empty space. Spread over four floors, there was more room than Vortex needed, but he'd claimed it all and he wasn't about to give it away. 

First Aid had the run of the place, even the holding cells and the interrogation rooms. The Autobot never concealed his distaste for Vortex's work, but the Quintessons and Sharkticons that passed into his care weren't exactly the most sympathetic of prisoners. The Sweeps hadn't brought him an Autobot since Hound, and that had been in the wake of the final battle, when First Aid lay grieving for cycles on Vortex's bunk. The medic had never known. 

Vortex let them into the office, a rounded protrusion on the side of the tower with one long, wide window showing a reddish tinted view of Kaon. Banks of computers stood silent and inert, their aeons-old circuitry as yet untested. Vortex took the chair closest to the single working computer, and spun it slowly as he re-arranged his rotors. First Aid tried to disentangle himself and get up, but Vortex grabbed him around the waist, and tugged him onto his lap. 

"I can work around you." He kicked the chair closer to the console, and pulled a datapad from a shelf underneath. 

First Aid took it, looking uncertain. He could get up if he wanted, but Vortex didn't want him to, and it was obvious he knew that Vortex didn't want him to. 

"I won't be a distraction?" he said quietly, glancing over Vortex's shoulder at the door. 

"Not unless you want to be," Vortex said, laying that option open as though it had ever been closed. He tilted First Aid's chin up, and lightly kissed the edge of his mask. The metal rolled back instantly, and the Autobot met his lips; his kiss was slow, lingering, full of the same longing that manifested in his energy field. He'd need to connect, but not yet. Vortex could wait. 

Breaking the kiss, First Aid made himself comfortable, leaning on the chair arm, his legs over Vortex's thighs. Vortex plugged himself into the console, then put one arm around First Aid's back, a hand resting on his waist. He could easily work like this. 

* * *

_Journal recording 039_

This is an addiction.

I don't know how else to describe it. 

It began because I was lonely, scared, isolated. Vortex was the only living being I'd seen in orns. And then Mathers came; injured and frail, the last human I saw, possibly the last human I will ever see. He died, I took it badly. Vortex was there, he... he doesn't hide his feelings well, not up close. His expression is always so hard to read, but his energy field... it was all there. 

I took the comfort offered. 

I kept on taking. 

I'm still taking. Still using him to help shore myself up. Sometimes I think I love him, but I don't think love is the right word. Or maybe it is. I'm used to him, I want him, I know him. I've seen who he is, what he's like. I've watched him work, and his methods are cruel, cold. But they're not what I expected. There's no torture chamber, no rack of instruments dreamed up by sick minds. He manipulates. He talks to them, his subjects, he twists their words, makes them uncomfortable in their own metal skin. 

He tricks them into spilling their secrets. He makes them think he is their ally, that he can get them a chair suited to their frame, fuel they can drink, a chance at a hearing. 

He buys secrets with lies, and when he's done the Sweeps come and take them away. 

I don't know what happens next. I don't want to know.

I want him to finish his meeting with Onslaught and stop being the interrogator, just for a while. I want him to come back here to his room, his recharge, and help me forget. 

* * *

"Blast Off to Vortex, respond." 

Vortex groaned. The comm panel by the door was flashing.

"Blast Off to Vortex. I'm not coming down there. Respond."

"Get fragged." Vortex arched his back and spun his rotors, then slumped down closer to his Autobot. First Aid murmured, but didn't wake. 

"Your eloquence never ceases to impress me," Blast Off commented. "You have visitors." The comm crackled and died. Vortex groaned again. He didn't want to get up; he was warm and comfortable, and he wanted nothing more than to spend the time between waking and work enjoying his conquest.

But he had visitors. 

Could be interesting. 

First Aid didn't wake. Vortex stroked him from shoulder to hip, so beautiful. The medic curled in on himself, his engine hitching. His mask was closed, and Vortex would have loved to have seen if his lips were curved in an unconscious smile. His energy field was in flux, as ever. Contentment warred with sorrow, the former peaking as Vortex stroked him, then dying down when he lifted his hand. Fascinating. 

Only twenty orns together, and he was learning so much. They both were.

He scrawled a note on a datasheet and magnetised it to the door. Any opportunity to show his regard was an opportunity worth taking. 

* * *

_Journal Recording 040_

I don't like waking up alone. Vortex has been called away, it's not his fault. Still, it's difficult not to wonder where he went and who he's with. Official business, no doubt. Things I shouldn't think about.

It's strange to lie here and look out the window. I was built on Earth, its blue skies and clouds and soup of organic life are more natural to me than constant stars, and swarms of feral nanites. 

Eleven months ago, Vortex gave me a glitchmouse. It's living in a cage in my old room. I never set it free. Was it kinder to keep it? I've corrupted its programming, tamed it. Out there, it would live a constant round of terror and hunger, always running, always scavenging. In here, it's safe, contained. Alone. 

It would be easy for me to make a metaphor of the glitchmouse, but our situations are not the same. It is a captive, I am not. I have comfort, affection. We both have everything we need for our own health and maintenance, but I know this is not a prison, it's a sanctuary. The glitchmouse has no idea. 

I miss everyone I've lost, I miss Earth. I'm lonely. But it could be worse. I have a purpose here, I'm useful to the team. One day, who knows... Peace, an amnesty. The surviving Autobots, and please _please_ , Sigma let them live; they'll come out of hiding, we'll rebuild together. 

Sometimes, I dream of that day. Only my dream is impossible. Springer is there, and Silverbolt and Rodimus, and everyone who died in the battle nine months ago. I recite their names every rotation of the planet, I call their images to mind and check the integrity of my memories. I couldn't save them, but I can save what remains of them. 

Mathers too. And my team. I miss them all so badly.

* * *

"Prisoner transfer." Dead End held up a datapad. Behind him, an automated trolley supported a large and sturdy crate. Something moved inside, and a trail of pink dripped from a crack in the corner. 

"What happened to the Sweeps?" Vortex said. It wasn't usual for Galvatron to let the Combaticons and Stunticons mix, not after Swindle and Motormaster convinced Cyclonus to commit him to Torqulon.

Dead End shrugged. He was spotless, as always, perfectly polished. Some way behind him, Drag Strip paced, obviously bored. They made for a pleasant change of scenery. In a purely visual sense.

"We brought him in," Drag Strip snapped. "Cyclonus thinks he's done for, wanted you to have a crack at him before he cranks out. Now hurry up and sign the forms."

"The Sweeps went to Earth," Dead End added. "I can't imagine why." He glared at the data pad. 

"They like the radiation." Drag Strip smirked. "Got a thing for fragging at ground zero, they say it's like doing Galvatron."

Dead End sighed. "Cretin."

Vortex glanced over the forms. "Who is it?" He toed the base of the trolley. "The forms don't say."

Drag Strip's face split in a cruel grin. "You'll see," he said. "Motormaster said to make sure Swindle's there when you open it up, but Cyclonus wants some answers first so... yeah, if Swindle ain't at home, you might not wanna wait. I don't give a frag. Your call. C'mon." He transformed, and sped across the acid-pocked wasteland at the foot of Combaticon HQ. Vortex could remember when it had been a public plaza, then a munitions dump for seized Autobot weapons, then a holding pen for the condemned, with barricades as high as Omega Supreme. A battleground, a graveyard, a desert of rust. 

So many ages, all summed up in one place. 

He put his glyph to the forms and Dead End snatched the data pad, then he too was off, speeding after Drag Strip back to the heart of Kaon. 

The crate clanged from an internal impact; its lurching made the trolley rock. Vortex grabbed the handle. Inside, his prisoner moaned. 

He leaned down, peering through the narrow ventilation gap. Sallow shafts of light cut through the gloom, revealing corrosion and oil and energon. And blue paint, a broken window, the curve of a hood. Black numbers on a square of white, human text marked out by an Autobot's hands. _38._

This could be interesting. Or disastrous. He would need to manage it carefully.

Blue optics fizzled on and off, a handsome mouth spasmed in a snarl. 

"Be nice," Vortex said. "I might have a use for you."

* * *

_Journal recording 041_

He's been gone for a joor. It isn't long, but I can't settle. 

I watched the news for a while. There are five channels so far, all official. Propaganda sits side by side with old Cybertronian programmes I've never heard of and mostly don't understand. I used to watch the news. I used to scour the footage for any hint of what happened to the other Autobots.

Six months ago, they showed an execution. I should have turned it off. I shouldn't have waited to see who it was, I shouldn't have listened.

They shot Eject in the head, then the chest. Two short-range blasts, so cruel; but at least it was quick. They made Blaster watch while Cyclonus read the list of charges. The camera showed a close-up; Blaster's dented face, a fractured optic. They said he was a traitor, they accused him of conspiring with the Quintessons to ally against Cybertron. They said he made an attempt on Soundwave's life, that he took advantage of the clemency offered him only to betray everything they were working for.

After that, Vortex suggested that perhaps I shouldn't watch the news so much. He showed me how to access the schedules so I could avoid the things I might not want to see. 

There's one show that I like. It's about an inventor and a demobilised ground assault unit who get sucked into a wormhole and have to try to get home again. It was made before the war, and I have difficulties with the accents sometimes, although they speak an Iaconian dialect that's in my core programming. It's bizarre, and the narrative isn't entirely linear, but I like it. It isn't on for another two days though. 

I think I like it because it reminds me of my creators. Sometimes I'm selfish, and I wish they were still alive. But they died before this war, before Galvatron and Cyclonus and the Quintessons. They belong to another age. 

I've already mourned for them, but I had my brothers then. We coped together, we were strong for each other. I don't need to be strong for anyone any more. 

I still need someone to be strong for me.

* * *

He couldn't do it without Onslaught.

Well, he could, but the consequences weren't worth it. He'd taken enough blows for neglecting to gain permission about First Aid. To do the same with his new prisoner would not go well for any of them. 

Vortex made the comm from the doorway. The prisoner beat at the inside of his crate, cramped and broken, but hopefully not bleeding out too quickly. 

"You have who?" Onslaught said, then, sounding distant. "Quiet, I'm taking a call. Vortex, repeat."

"You heard me," Vortex said. "I think we could be onto a good thing, but he's in bad shape, he needs a medic."

"Could be dangerous," Onslaught said. 

"I can handle it. Just give me time, I'll get what Cyclonus wants, and we'll get something out of it. Everyone's a winner."

"Careful, you're starting to sound like Swindle."

Vortex laughed, and the sounds from the crate ceased. _Someone_ was listening in. Vortex turned down the volume on his comms, and walked a few paces away. "So am I good to go?"

"If I said no, you'd do it anyway." Onslaught paused, and Vortex could hear Brawl in the background talking about cluster bombs and blast radii. "All right, you have my conditional approval. If something happens and I don't like it, this is over. Is that understood?"

"Sure," Vortex said. "Perfectly, commander."

"Good. Onslaught out."

* * *

_Journal recording 042_

Smokescreen is alive. 

I can't believe it. I don't know what to think. I'm trembling, but I have to keep a steady hand. I need recharge, I've been awake too long. 

I'm so... excited? No. Agitated. I want to go back to him, but I can't risk working on him while I'm this exhausted. Vortex had to carry me out of the isolation cell. He had to activate the lock and change the code. I would have gone back. 

It was the right call. I'm too eager. I want to help, but first I need to rest. 

It's just, so much has happened. Vortex called me down a joor after I woke up. Said he had a surprise for me. Not a good surprise, he said, not completely, but he thought I might be pleased. 

Sometimes, the differences between us are so stark, but I can still appreciate that he meant something good by it. 

He took me to one of the holding cells. At first, I couldn't process what I was seeing. Vortex gave me a gentle nudge, getting me over the threshold. My olfactory receptors did better than my visual analysers. The odour was strong; old energon, spoiled oil, impurities of all kinds. The smell of sickness and decay. And of injury; the acrid stench of burnt copper and melted plastic. It took a second or two for my optical processors to catch up. Oh, Smokescreen. 

He lay on a platform in the centre of the room, a jumble of parts only nominally connected. His helm sparked, and I could see his fuel pump clearly through a hole in his chassis. 

I started work straight away. Vortex assumed the role of assistant. He summoned the drone, and made it fetch me things from med-bay six storeys below. 

Each time it came back into the room, wearing Blades' frame, seeing through his optics, my core froze. I worked on, I couldn't let Smokescreen down. 

Oh scrap, what if Smokescreen saw Blades? What must he think? 

I need to slow my fuel distribution, I need to be calm, rational. Smokescreen wasn't lucid. He struggled and kicked with his working leg. He tried to bite me when I examined the damage to his face. He screamed when I leaned his head forward to plug into his diagnostic port. 

It must have been awful for him, but he wasn't cognisant. The torture of a fever dream shouldn't touch his long term memory, and if it does, well, I'll deal with that when we come to it. 

He's stable now. He has multiple contusions, a shattered gear box, cracks in his chassis, grade two rust scarring, memory corruption, a chip in his transformation cog, lacerated tires, dislocations at most of his major joints, and symptoms of severe energon starvation. And that's without listing his minor injuries.

I can only imagine what he's been through. 

But he's safe now. Vortex says we can treat him. He says Smokescreen and Swindle have a history, that Swindle wouldn't want him taken offline. 

I get the impression Swindle hasn't been consulted. 

It's just the four of us in Combaticon HQ. Myself, Vortex, Blast Off and Smokescreen. The others have gone to a weapons convention, I don't know where. They're not due back until the end of the week. 

I wonder if Smokescreen thinks in Earth terms, if he still keeps the western calendar, the one we used when we lived in the US. Or does he keep time as on old Cybertron, like the Combaticons. 

I can't ask him yet. I left him in stasis. The computer sends me his readings, I've got them up in the top left of my viewscreen. His ventilation is slow, circulation sluggish, but that's only to be expected. Tomorrow, I'll start on his repairs. 

Now, I need to sleep.

* * *

_Journal recording 043_

My recharge cycle ended too quickly. Denfensor is whispering to me; he tells me to stop shooting, he says that Megatron has called the retreat.

I don't know who he was talking to when he spoke those words aloud. 

This is the start of my second year without him. Them. 

My shaking woke Vortex up. Again. He was so good about it. I don't know where he finds the patience. He's never like this with anyone else, not even the time Swindle came back from a mission missing his arm and Vortex couldn't get him to med-bay fast enough. 

He didn't let me up. I wanted to see to Smokescreen, but he could tell I wasn't ready. He rolled me over onto my front and did that thing he does with my seams that makes me tingle everywhere inside. So warm, like I'm melting. It slowed my fuel pumps and made my ventilation deeper, more effective. 

Sometimes I wonder how I can trust him. Then he does something like this. 

"A few more joors," he said, "and you can be the medic again."

"Until then?" I craned to look over my shoulder. He was closer than I thought. He smiled, and so help me I wanted him. 

"Until then," he said, as his smile turned wicked and he leaned in closer. "There's just us."

* * *

Vortex sat on the edge of the recharge platform. First Aid straddled his lap, spike out and valve completely filled. Vortex set the pace, hands on the Autobot's hips, guiding him. First Aid liked to feel small, contained, safe. Vortex had learnt that early on. He wanted Vortex to hold him or cover him. He liked to hide his face against Vortex's shoulder, arms stretched up, fingers gliding lightly over rotor blades. 

Even better, he responded well to instruction. He seemed to like it, that relinquishing of control. 

"Look at me," Vortex whispered, and that blue visor came immediately into his field of vision. First Aid shifted his weight, bracing himself on Vortex's shoulders. No more rotor play, but he could live with that. "Let me see you."

The Autobot's mask slid back. His lips were slightly parted, his cheeks hot to the touch. He pressed their visors gently together, his optics wide and his vents coming in short ragged bursts. 

"Tighter," Vortex demanded, and the response spread stars through his visual field. "Frag, you feel good."

First Aid murmured a reply, still moving to the rhythm Vortex set.

"I want to feel you," Vortex said, and he brushed his thumb over the panel at First Aid's waist. "Connect with me." He used to phrase it as a question until the time he forgot himself in the heat of arousal, and the response had been stunning. 

First Aid's panel opened under his fingertips, his connector already sparking, his port crawling with charge. 

"Oh scrap!" First Aid's valve clenched and his optics dimmed. A shiver worked through him, overload denied, the charge ebbing. Vortex clicked his connector home, then slid the Autobot's plug into his own port. the interface established. 

Vortex lifted him a moment from the spike, and dipped two fingers slowly past the rim of his valve. 

First Aid whined in obvious frustration. His valve clamped down, and Vortex slid in a third finger. This suited him better. His optics flared, a flash in Vortex's vision that dazzled him. 

"Tell me what you want." It was obvious, conveyed through the Autobot's body language, through the interface. Vortex didn't need to hear it, but hot scrap he wanted to. 

First Aid squirmed, his fans turning up a gear and his vents blasting hot air. "Please," he mouthed, hardly a sound emerging. 

Vortex scissored his fingers and drew them far enough out that they were just inside the rim. He flared his energy field from those three points. 

"Oh scrap, please! Please spike me... I..." First Aid appeared to run out of words. He tried to grind down on Vortex's fingers, the picture of frustration. But the interface was adamant, the teasing wound him up like nothing else. 

"You... what?" Vortex pressed, his voice low, his rotors quivering. "Tell me."

"I need you... please." Another dribbled of lubricant, a surge of charge as Vortex teased the internal nodes. First Aid fought for air. "I... Spike me, please, now, _please_."

Vortex stretched his fingers wider, and allowed the Autobot to lower his aft just enough that the tip of his spike nudged the gap between them. Too much, too wide. He slid his fingers out, leaving a trail of clear lubricant over the Autobot's aft and thigh. 

"You're holding back," Vortex said softly. Frag, he wanted to pound into the Autobot, to feel his spike rub over all those wonderful internal ridges, to feel the nodes spark as they collided and circuits ignited. "What aren't you telling me?"

It was a dangerous game, what if he pushed too far? But the interface was his failsafe. It showed him First Aid's pleasure, his nervous anticipation. It showed him he could push as hard as he liked in this direction, that First Aid _wanted_ him to push. 

"You want my spike?"

First Aid nodded so hard their visors clashed. Vortex smoothed the back of his helm and sent a pulse of warm comfort across the connection while that little spur of pain faded. First Aid pressed against him, kissed him hard. Unexpected, but oh so nice. Still, he held the Autobot's hips, keeping him from drawing any more of the spike inside himself. 

"You want it," Vortex murmured, feeling the vibration of his words through his captive's lips. "You tell me what you're holding back."

First Aid circled his hips, then pinched at the tip of Vortex's spike with his valve. Frag, he was flexible. Strong too, but not as strong as Vortex, and there was no way he was getting spiked until Vortex decided he was.

"Tell me," he repeated, and First Aid kissed him deeper, moved a hand up to his rotors, fondling the tip of one blade. 

"I think I'm in love with you."

The surge of triumph eclipsed even his arousal for a long and heady moment. Vortex had been waiting for those words, hoping for them. It was another threshold crossed, another victory. And yet, in all the simulations he'd run, he'd never hit on the right words to respond. Scrap the simulations, he didn't need to be careful. "Oh frag yes," he moaned as he released his grip on the Autobot's hips and followed the glowing pleasure of his spike sliding home. 

* * *

_Journal recording 044_

I should never have told him. I don't even know if it's true. Do I love him? Can I love? After everything I've been through? But if felt so right, and in the heat of the moment... Oh scrap, just thinking about it makes me ache. 

Would I have told him if he hadn't insisted? I don't know. He was happy, _very_ happy. You can't fake that, not connected. I'll need to make a few adjustments later, when I have a spare half hour. We were a little... forceful, afterwards. Enthusiastic. 

I'm not sure I should want him this badly. I know that he isn't what I thought, he can be tender and considerate. He could have killed me a thousand times over, could have hurt me, but he hasn't. He could have hurt Smokescreen, but instead he negotiated help, he gave Smokescreen into my care. 

But still, his ideals, his ethics, they're so alien to me. He was built for the realities of war, I was built in the hope of peace. It isn't something we can't overcome, but sometimes... I don't know. I can't help but see us the way Smokescreen might. I look like a prisoner, like I'm trading erotic favours for safety. That isn't how things are. He kept me safe before, without asking anything of me. _I_ approached _him_. _I_ asked _him_ to hold me and connect with me, and 'face with me. 

I suppose I expected him to love me back. I can't expect it. He's a Decepticon, it isn't culturally appropriate for him to admit something like that. But scrap, if his actions are anything to go by...

He's out finding me some fuel now, we drank the rest of his in his room last night. Frivolous, I know, but there's no shortage any more, we aren't being rationed. 

I have another hour before Vortex is prepared to give me the code to Smokescreen's room. Oh Sigma, this shouldn't feel so right. 

* * *

_Journal recording 045_

I have the code. 

Vortex and Blast Off have been called away, I don't know where. Vortex said he'd tell me when he gets back. I doubt it's something I'd be comfortable about. 

The drone is keyed to obey my voice. I don't want to command it. It stands by the door, my guard and assistant. Earlier, I caught myself reaching for its arm as it dragged the medical console a little closer to Smokescreen's bunk. 

When I see it in the corner of my visual field, it's like Blades has come back to me. 

I've shut the door on it now. I want to apologise, but it isn't sentient, it isn't Blades. Oh Sigma, how am I going to do this?

* * *

_Journal recording 046_

I'm feeling better now. The drone is by the outer door, and has instruction to remain there and ping me if someone comes. I can pass as a drone too, if I have time to prepare. I've been practising. 

I hope I don't need to. 

Smokescreen is my priority now. His levels are stable, his core holds. Cybernetic brain activity is within acceptable parameters. He is stable. Stable isn't necessarily good, but it's better than several of the other possibilities. 

I wish I could remove the painted purple sigil from my shoulder. I don't want the first thing Smokescreen sees to be me wearing the Decepticon insignia. 

I fasten a cloth to cover it, make it look like I put it there to clean my hands. 

Lights, instruction: increase brightness by 10.4% 

There, that's better. All of Smokescreen's tubes are secure; there are no leaks any more, and I've scrubbed the worst of the corrosion away. I want to cover that hole in his chassis, and realign his joints before bringing him out of stasis. 

This could take a while. 

* * *

Smokescreen awoke to a nightmare. 

It didn't look like a nightmare, not at first. It looked good and wholesome and normal. He lay on a med-berth, the thick layer of padding giving relief to his aching joints. First Aid was with him, radiating calm competence and compassion. He had equipment, tools, a monitor registering Smokescreen's vital signs. 

All normal. All _right_. Only it wasn't, but the wrongness was elusive, and it wasn't until his reboot was over and he started to take in the details that he began to work out why. 

First Aid was with him. 

First Aid was missing in action. Presumed dead. First Aid had vanished when Cyclonus shot Defensor apart, when Hot Spot and Groove and Streetwise had died. The only bodies they'd never found had been First Aid and Blades. 

But First Aid was here. Alone. No nurse, no med-bots. Just the CMO.

Smokescreen tried to believe, he longed to believe it was really First Aid, that one of the Protectobots had survived. But it was hard, and he kept noticing other details. Details that didn't help. 

There was a small, barred window in the door. 

What kind of med-bay had bars on the door?

The walls were lilac-grey, and scratched. Some of the scratches were light, everyday, innocuous, but not by the door. There, the scratches were deeper, sinister.

He twisted around, tried to see if there was a window in any of the walls, if it had bars like the one on the door. 

His berth had restraints. 

“Can you hear me?” First Aid said. “Smokescreen, it's me. You're safe now. You're going to be all right.”

“What? No...” Smokescreen bucked, trying to see above his head. His arms wrenched, his engine sputtered. “No... Aid... What's going on? Where are we?” 

He knew medical restraints, had seen them often enough over the vorns. Medical restraints were strong but well padded, designed to keep the patient still without causing further injury, they were meant to be comfortable. 

Theses were not medical restraints. 

“Smokescreen, please,” First Aid leaned over him, optics as blue and wide and worried as he'd ever seen. “Your connections are fragile, you need to lie still.”

He shook his head, and the shaking became violent, spreading down his body. “No.. I don't like this. Where are we? You won't tell me where we are! Aid, please! It hurts, please...”

“All right, Smokescreen,” First Aid said, venting slow and deep. “All right, if I can just gain access to your medical port...” 

Something clicked at the back of Smokescreen's neck, and he began to truly panic.

* * *

_Journal recording 047_

Smokescreen is awake. He's drowsy, I had to administer a mild sedative. It was that or fasten him to the platform. But he's conscious, and he knows me, and he wants us to leave together as soon as he's able. It's like with Mathers all over again. I don't know how to convince him. We're safe here. 

Something else happened. A group of Sweeps turned up, they had passcodes. I played the drone, opening doors for them, showing them the store rooms, handing them the inventory to our supply of energon. They laughed at Blades... at his frame. They wanted to know why he wasn't kept as well as me. I didn't answer, I'm not programmed to. 

They seemed bored. I hope it was just about the energon. I hope I didn't do anything wrong. 

* * *

_Journal recording 048_

Vortex hasn't returned. I need to recharge, but I don't want to go back to his bunk. It's too big for me by myself. Too empty. 

Smokescreen has periods of lucidity. The second time he woke, he was terrified. He reached for the clip where his gun used to be, started yelling at someone to get down, they were coming. 

Then his optics gained focus and he grew still. He looked at me, the photoreceptors in his eyes blinking on and off as he tried to work out whether or not I was real. 

"Smokescreen," I said softly. "You're safe now. Do you recognise me?"

"Aid," he said, and his voice came out as a croak. "Is that really you?"

It wasn't the time for stiff formality. I've known Smokescreen as long as I've been online. I leaned over the bunk and hugged him, and he laughed, and it sounded so broken, but at least he's alive. He held on so long, then he pushed me back to look at me all over again. 

"I can't believe you survived," he said. "Where are we? What's going on? Are there others?"

I shook my head; he'd forgotten already. That didn't bode well for his short term memory. 

I told him everything again. The bare bones of my final battle, of our flight into the wasteland, and Vortex finding me, keeping me safe. I told him where we were and the arrangement between myself and the Combaticons. I didn't tell him that Vortex and myself had been intimate for the best part of a year, he had enough to process. 

He got agitated when I tried to explain that we're safe here. I almost mentioned what Vortex had said about Swindle, but I didn't. I can't imagine the gulf of time between the Golden Age and now, how long Smokescreen has lived since Swindle was put in the Detention Centre. 

Something I've noticed about the Combaticons over the last nine months: they live with one foot in the past. They look out of their towers and they see Cybertron as it used to be in the Golden Age. They see the start of the war. They don't see the end, the desolation, the millions of years under Shockwave when the planet almost died there was so little energon. 

Smokescreen doesn't live in the past. He lives in the moment, and I can't expect he and Swindle to see eye-to-eye about a reunion, whatever their connection was before the war. 

Right now, all I can do is see to Smokescreen's repairs, keep him comfortable, reassure him.

When Vortex comes back, Smokescreen will see that I'm safe. He'll understand that this team may wear the insigia and they may live by a code of military honour whose instigators died over nine million years ago, but they are not the Decepticons he's known. They're different. 

Vortex, please come back soon.

* * *

_Journal recording 048_

He still hasn't returned. I watch from the window of his recharge, looking for the tell-tale marks of a heliformer or a shuttle in the sky. All I see are seekers, dozens of them. They're pulling military manoeuvres, ones I recognise from the Aerialbots. But no bombs fall, and every so often when the wind is right I can hear the faint sound of cheering. 

After a while, I don't see them any more. All I see is Cyclonus cutting Rodimus's cables. Galvatron raising the Matrix. I see Abominus slicing Arcee's chest apart and tearing out her laser core. I see Silverbolt beaten but still dignified as Astrotrain burns off his wings. 

I raise the lights so I can't see out.

* * *

_Journal recording 049_

It's cold in here, and I'm not sure if it's because I'm tired and alone and Smokescreen's suspicions are eating at me, or if it's genuinely become cooler. 

Vortex still isn't back. I'm so tired. I should rest, but I need him around me. What if something's happened? I have his comm freq, but this isn't an emergency. I could ping him, like a drone would do to signal that something was wrong. But nothing is wrong. I'm just scared and tired and cold, and I don't want to be alone any more.

* * *

_Journal recording 050_

I tried to recharge in Smokescreen's cell. I can hardly call it a room. There are massive metal rings in the walls and floor where chains can be fastened, and thick, solid restrains on the bunk. 

He's going through emergency defragmentation, and his mind keeps throwing things out. He isn't conscious, but he's talkative. I set up the console to record everything he says, then went back to Vortex's room. Then to my room, then back to his. The gitchmouse doesn't approve of my coming and going without energon. I went back to my room and fed it, then tuned my old Earth-made radio and listened to the Autobot frequencies. I don't know if Soundwave's even paying attention any more. I'm not sure I care. 

I can't settle, I'm scared something will happen while I'm offline. 

I'm scared. 

* * *

_Journal recording 051_

The air show is over, the bars are open. There's a street race passing through Dead End. 

How can all this be alive when my brothers are dead? 

* * *

_Journal recording 052_

Vortex still isn't back. Seventy one hours and counting. Smokescreen's defrag is almost sixty-eight percent complete. I'm shaking again. 

* * *

_Journal recording 053_

Defensor says "Til all are one". I remember when Optimus told him that, and he repeated it back, he was so new. We all were. 

I made the drone walk the hallways in a random pattern. Every so often, when I'm not really expecting it, I see Blades. 

* * *

_Journal recording 054_

Maybe he's not coming back. 

* * *

"You're such a buzzkill," Vortex muttered. He resisted kicking Blast Off in his wide metal aft, and stalked off across the roof of Combaticon HQ to the elevator shaft. There was no actual elevator, there hadn't been for several million years, but that was no obstacle. 

"You're welcome," Blast Off spat above the noise of his transformation. 

Vortex was jittery. Two and half cycles without interfacing was two and a half too many, and most of that had been spent inside his hulking joyless team mate. There'd been a time when Blast Off had taken great pleasure in pinning him against the wall and fragging him senseless, but that time had ended with the Detention Centre. Vortex wouldn't have been surprised to find that the shuttle had ordered his interfacing hardware to be removed. 

Just like the personality part of his personality component. 

At least their mission had been a success. Subdue the natives, grab the energon, shoot anyone who got in their way. Done and done. 

Without the Autobots, it wasn't even a challenge. 

Thinking of Autobots brought him right back around to First Aid, and to interfacing. And more. But first he had to consolidate his new gains. So the Autobot loved him, or thought he did. That was only stage two, and now that stage two was complete: commence stage three.

Only the medic wasn't in Vortex's expansive and highly comfortable bed. He wasn't in his own room either, or in Smokescreen's cell. He'd been there, certainly, but Smokescreen was in some form of medically induced stasis, and First Aid was nowhere to be seen. 

He couldn't have left HQ. He had nowhere to go. And the drone would have pinged them. 

Where was the drone?

Vortex sent a location query on its frequency. The answer was immediate. 

Med-bay, the storage closet. 

First Aid's safe space. 

Vortex approached quietly, rolling the door back so as not to make too much noise. 

The drone was seated on the floor, rotors to the wall, and its legs stretched out in front. First Aid was scrunched on its lap, partially transformed with his hood over his head. He was in recharge, the drone's scratched and dented arms around him. 

Vortex watched him for a while. He was out cold, deep in his defrag cycle. He didn't even stir when Vortex commanded the drone to release him. Nor when Vortex picked him up, and carried him back to their shared room. 

Swindle might have to take the drone. It would be a shame, the thing was useful, but if First Aid was using it as an anchor to the past, it would need to go. 

* * *

_Journal recording 055_

I'm ashamed of myself. What was I thinking?

I used him, and I used the drone. I used Blades, his body. I... I was so scared and tired and lonely, but that isn't an excuse. 

Vortex says I have nothing to be sorry about. He's wrong. I woke in his arms, confused and panicky. My systems glitched, threw me straight out of defrag, and I didn't know where I was, what I was doing. I thought I was meant to be with Blades. 

Vortex held me. I struggled, I kicked him. Not on purpose, but there's a dent above his knee from my heel. He refuses to let me smooth it out.

I need to make it up to him.

* * *

Vortex flew low over the commercial sector. Close up, it still looked dead. Street after street with only his searchlights to illuminate them. Isolated pockets of neon held clusters of bars and shops, clubs with huge hulking grounders standing sentinel outside, small makeshift gambling dens and streetfighting cages. 

The population was mostly transient; soldiers back from Earth, enjoying their first orn of leave, new-builds allowed a cycle of recreation before deployment. Only the neutrals stuck around for long, patching up their lives, capitalising on the new prosperity. Decepticon was again simply the military caste, and civilians went brand-less. 

It was a good time to be based in Kaon. Vortex dipped between the jagged, green-lit buildings and transformed mid-air, landing in the street. The unbranded were thickest here, clustered for safety as much as opportunity. They glanced at him, long enough to clock who he was, then looked away. He ignored them, and headed for The Easy Mark. 

Inside, the club was wall-to-wall grounders. They pressed in on him, jostling, laughing, making sure their shiny new insignias gleamed in the light. Pride was programmed into them; they were Decepticons, conquerors, the greatest military force the universe had ever seen. They had respect too, a hard-wired inclination to admire and emulate veteran fighters.

Vortex pushed through, ignoring the hand on his aft, the heated whisper in his audial. He found Swindle in a corner booth, talking to a neutral. A pair of antique Kalissian pleasure drones lounged to either side. They wore ornate collars, and had been painted to mimic the colours of the dead Prime. Vortex slapped one on the spoiler to make it move.

“Don't scuff the merchandise,” Swindle said by way of greeting. He offered his wrist cable to the neutral. “Do we have a deal?”

The neutral leapt on the cable like it was the last energon goodie in the known universe. Vortex took the drone's seat, waiting while the contracts were exchanged. The drone lounged on the edge of the booth, purring softly. Vortex wondered if he should exchange it for Blades, but he doubted it'd be any good at heavy lifting. 

Eventually, Swindle took his cable back. “Pleasure doing business with you,” he said, and the neutral spouted some affirmative scrap before beating a retreat through the crowd towards the door. 

“Enjoying yourself?” Vortex asked. He picked up Swindle's cocktail, assessing the layers of multi-coloured additives, and took a swig. 

Swindle sighed and folded his arms behind his head. “Sure am,” he said. “Just bought controlling shares in the new casino, got a crate full of complimentary ordnance at the weapons con, and you owe me a drink. Life is good.”

“It's about to get better,” Vortex said. He took a further deep slug of Swindle's drink, making the aft-head wait.

“And?” Swindle said. He lowered his arms, leaned in. “Don't keep me hanging.”

Vortex put the drink down and leaned over, well aware of the poorly masked stares being thrown in their direction. Someone obviously thought they were about to get a free show. “I've got a present for you,” Vortex said, and Swindle's optics lit up in that predictable fervid way of his. 

“What's the catch?” he said.

Vortex grinned. “Smokescreen.”

Swindle's jaw dropped, but he recovered quickly, shuffling back and crossing his arms. “What's your game?”

“We can talk here?” Vortex said. 

Swindle looked hurt. “Of course we can fraggin' talk! I own the place, don't I? You're killing me, what's going on?”

Vortex grinned and helped himself to the rest of Swindle's cocktail. “The Stunticons caught him. Don't know how, don't know where. They brought him in. Cyclonus wants intel, I got a sideline in a private project, and you can have him after.”

“After?” Swindle's tone was flat. “After what? I know what 'after' means to you. I want him first.”

“Frag no.” Vortex gave the empty cube to one of the interface drones, and nudged it in the direction of the bar. “How am I gonna explain that? _He_ thinks you had a thing with Smokey, back in the Golden Age.”

“You told him what? You...” Swindle stood. “Back room,” he said, and strode off. 

Vortex followed in a round-about way, passing by the bar and fetching the Rodimus-a-like. Frag, if he wasn't getting steamed. All the heat from the new-builds, all that hardware he didn't have the time to try out. He could take one, perhaps two, give them half a breem in the alley around the corner. But no, he'd get paint scrapes on him, and he'd have to tell First Aid he'd been fighting. And that was more likely to trigger the Autobot's sympathy than his arousal; it just wasn't worth it. 

“I thought you said we could talk,” Vortex said, as the door closed and the noise of the bar became muffled. 

“We can, but... For frag sake, be careful with that!” Swindle glared at the drone, which in the absence of anything else to pose against had draped itself over Vortex. 

“I'm being careful.” Vortex patted it on the aft, and its purring went up a notch. “I get a freebie, right? This thing's amazing.” 

Swindle glared. “Oral only. No touching its valve, it's just been tuned. Why'd you tell your pet I had a thing with _him_.”

“Because,” Vortex said. “You kinda did.” There was no point trying to explain the way First Aid worked. His fingers found the drone's hip seam. “Kneel,” he said.

“Now?” Swindle said. “Seriously? You can't wait?”

“Saw you fucking Smokescreen once,” Vortex said. He kept his armour in place; let the drone work for it. “Before he screwed you over. That was a vision.” His ventilation clicked up a notch. The drone stroked and nuzzled, hands on his hips, and glossa lapping. It was nice not to have to issue a code; the drone took its cues from his body language, constantly learning.

“And this is payback how?” Swindle said. “I see you fucking all the time, I don't make something of it.”

“Not for lack of trying,” Vortex said. “Oh frag, this is good. You ever tried this? Slave, give him a show.” 

“You're just doing this to frag with me,” Swindle said. “I know you.” But he didn't seem able to stop himself looking as the drone hit the manual override for Vortex's spike cover. Vortex grabbed a chair and slumped, allowing the drone to raise its aft. It swayed, thighs spread, doing exactly what he'd told it to do.

“He's in forced stasis,” Vortex said, the charge making itself heard in his voice. “Aid seems to think he'll live.” 

“He's gonna wake up?” Swindle said. He began to pace, either to avoid looking at the drone's tilted aft and exposed valve, or because his mental vista was so much better. 

“I don't see why not.” Vortex sighed; the work on the Blades drone had been good, but it was nothing compared to this. “Play along, let Aid think you got nothing but the best intentions. We pay Tripwire to clean up Smokey's programming, keep him quiet about Aid. Give you a bit of control. How much do you think you could make from him?”

Swindle's grin turned feral, and Vortex's interface circuits thrilled. He'd always liked that smile, and frag but Swindle was a cruel piece of work sometimes. 

“Revenge is sweet,” Vortex whispered. He gripped the arms of the chair, hips bucking once as his spike discharged into the drone's tight mouth. 

“Needed that, didn't you?” Swindle commented. 

Vortex patted the drone's warm cheek. It licked its lips at him and, in one sinuous movement, slid up into his lap.

“I said no valve,” Swindle snapped. “Slave unit G87, _cease_.”

The drone pouted and stood, hip cocked, head tilted in an arrogant display of some of the finest goods Kaon had to offer. It wasn't disappointed, it hadn't the capacity, but Vortex had to admit it was a good way to squeeze a few extra credits from Swindle's clients. 

“Close your panel and get back in the bar.”

“Think of all that lovely money,” Vortex said. He packed his spike away. “You can just see it, can't you? Grounders on all sides, and he's compelled to do whatever the scrap you want him to. He can't talk about it, he can't object. Bet you wanna hear him beg.” 

Swindle stood contrapposto, hand on his chin, his optics shrewd. “What do you get out of it?”

Vortex shrugged. “Your undying gratitude.”

* * *

“How are you feeling?” First Aid knelt by the repair berth, both his hands wrapped around Smokescreen's chipped blue fist. It was all Smokescreen could do to stop himself from crushing the medic's slim fingers. 

If only the door wasn't open. If only the enemy wasn't leaning there, watching.

Smokescreen's optics flickered, and black stars danced through his vision. “Rough,” he said, and tried to force a smile. “I...” He shuddered, thinking of the claw marks in the wall, the cruel restraints on the bunk. “I can't...” 

“It's all right,” First Aid said. “You're safe, remember. He's not going to hurt you.”

He didn't feel safe, but what was he meant to do? He watched the 'con watching him. Vortex was large, well-maintained, armed. Smirking. “What do you want?”

First Aid glanced briefly back at Vortex. He must be terrified. Smokescreen's engine revved, his tanks churning at the thought of what that monster must have put him through. 

But First Aid was calm when he spoke. “He doesn't want anything,” he said. “He's here to help, like me.”

Smokescreen shuddered, his fists clenched tighter. First Aid winced. 

“Sorry,” Smokescreen said. He uncurled his hand. “I'm so sorry.” But he wasn't looking at First Aid any more; Vortex was approaching. 

“First Aid's right,” Vortex said, moving up behind the medic. He lay a hand on the medic's shoulder. “I never asked to get dragged into a war with the Autobots. I just want my life back.”

 _Let him go!_ Smokescreen wanted to scream, to grab a gun and start shooting. He wanted out of there, and why didn't First Aid flinch? How in the name of Cybertron could he be so calm when Vortex was touching him. Then First Aid stood, and Vortex had the audacity to move that hand to his waist. 

This couldn't be right. “What's going on?”

But Vortex spoke over him, watching him. Making sure he saw? “Aid, will you be OK in here?” 

The medic nodded again. To Smokescreen's horror, he patted Vortex's hand, then walked around the berth to his trolley of tools. “I'll be fine, I have a lot to do.” 

* * *

_Journal recording 056_

Smokescreen is suspicious. 

I don't mean about Vortex's intentions, although he is, and that's completely understandable. I mean about Vortex and me. If only Vortex could keep his hands to himself. But I'm at fault too. He's there for me, and I lean on him. He shows how much he cares, and I reciprocate. It's not a conscious response, but it's one that I should be able to curb sometimes, if only for Smokescreen's sake. 

* * *

“You got options,” Tripwire said. She leaned her pointed elbows on the table, and watched Swindle over the top of her wrist tires. “None of them's cheap, but if you want it done right, I'm your Insecticon.”

Vortex sprawled in the booth next to them, half listening. The bar was quiet, the factories wouldn't spew their latest load of customers for another few joors yet, but there was a heavy grounder arm wrestling with a neutral construction femme two tables over. Vortex had money on the femme. 

“You'd recommend partitioning?” Swindle said, and Vortex began to pay more attention.

“Sure,” Tripwire replied. “I've had clients pay for it to be done to themselves. Indentured servants, mainly, working to pay off their debts. They work all day somewhere like... well, not like this, somewhere low caste. Then they swap over, soon as they're out, forget all about the nasty sordid things they've done.” 

Swindle appeared to consider it, then shook his head. “I don't want him to forget.”

“But we can't have him blabbing,” Vortex said. “What about the personality over-ride option?”

“That's a software add-on,” Tripwire said. She shuttered her cluster of optics in sequence, and briefly strummed her winglets. “Satisfying work, but it comes with risks.”

“Which are?” Swindle prompted. 

“Interrupted access to long term storage, corruption of short-term memory, and there's a chance his native programming will reject the add-on. In some cases, the subject has been able to resist the over-ride for short periods.”

“How many is some?” Vortex asked. Two tables over, the construction femme was winning. 

“There's a point two eight percent chance,” Tripwire responded. “But that's over all the practitioners I've known for the last twenty thousand vorns. I've had it happen twice. You can always put in a failsafe.” She tapped the side of her helm. “He disobeys... kaboom!”

Swindle flinched, but Tripwire didn't appear to notice. 

Vortex laughed. “If I wanted to put a bomb in his head, there'd already be a bomb in his head.” And First Aid would find out and remove it, regardless what he was told, and Vortex would have some serious lying to do. 

“No bombs,” Swindle said. “With personality over-ride, is he still conscious?”

“Sure is.” Tripwire's mandibles separated in a grin. “His behaviour will just be... modified. You don't want him to say 'camshaft' in mixed company, he won't say 'camshaft'. You don't want him touching your guns, he won't.”

“Does it run the other way?” Vortex said. “Can you get him to proactively say things that are against his programming. I dunno, like 'Swindle, that's a flattering shade of greeny yellow'?”

Swindle threw him an evil look. 

“No problem,” Tripwire said. “The way it works, you get a passkey, and you can code in any behaviour you like. And I mean _any_.”

“Nice,” Vortex said. He thought briefly of First Aid, but no, he already had one toy that responded to codes. And where would be the satisfaction in achieving his goals that way? He wanted First Aid free will and all. He wanted him changed, of course, but permanently, properly. No drugs, no new software, no reformatting. No force, just suggestion, seduction, corruption.

“Any, you say?” Swindle smirked. “I think we have a winner.”

* * *

_Journal recording 057_

I think I have a plan of action. 

Smokescreen's fears are justified, he has ample logical reason to believe that the Combaticons will harm him. They won't, but I can't expect him to trust me without good cause. He hasn't lived here for the past nine months. He doesn't know them. 

I've arranged a course of talking therapy and positive reinforcement. It will run alongside the necessary physical therapies to ensure proper integration of his replacement parts.

When they arrive. 

I dread to think where they'll come from, but beggars can't be choosers. Marissa used to say that. 

I call up the sound of her voice, and for a moment it's like she's still alive. 

Sometimes I think about Carly and Daniel and Spike and Sparkplug. Did they survive? Are they on Earth? What are their lives like now?

Smokescreen might know. I haven't pressed him for information, he can tell me in his own time. It will be part of the therapy, and the thought they could be dead gives me the selfish wish that I wasn't in the position of therapist. I never trained for this, I hardly ever practised it. It's a part of my base coding, activated when Ratchet and Wheeljack brought me online, but I'm not a therapist. Ironically, Smokescreen is the one with appropriate training. 

I keep wondering how I'm meant to do this. I don't want to swap war stories. I don't want to catalogue the dead. I haven't dealt with my own monsters, how am I meant to help with his?

But I'll find a way. I can't let my insecurities get in the way of his recovery. 

I left him in forced recharge, I need to get some rest. I worry that he'll try to run off otherwise. He's safe there, though. The compound is secure, no-one can possibly harm him. 

Vortex should be back in a joor or two. I hope so. 

* * *

“I need him conscious.” Tripwire clacked her mandibles, and skittered her claws over Smokescreen's hood. “Nice specimen. Trophy?”

Swindle nodded. “Un-huh. You don't need a medic to bring him online, do you?”

“Of course not,” Tripwire said. “But you might want to strap him down.”

Vortex stepped up to secure Smokescreen while Swindle jittered. First Aid had done an excellent job. The rust had gone, the holes were patched. The minor damage was still there, but he wasn't leaking any more, and his limbs were all attached. 

“Done,” Vortex said, and Tripwire moved in.

“He'll be conscious for around a breem,” she said. “Then he'll need a hard reboot. He'll be out maybe two joors. Let him wake up by himself, then you can start adding little extras.” She gave Swindle a piercing look. “I'll leave the details up to you.”

Swindle nodded again. Vortex got a taste of his triumph through the team bond, and his hatred. 

“It's been a long time coming,” he commented, and Swindle's answering smile was vicious. 

It was good to see. Even better was the look on Smokescreen's face when he came to. 

“Shhhh,” Vortex said, putting a finger on his lips. But it didn't matter how his mouth contorted, Tripwire had disabled his vocaliser and nothing was coming out. Smokescreen snapped his teeth. “Now now,” Vortex tapped him on the nose. “No biting, you've got a visitor.”

Swindle stepped forward, and Smokescreen began to struggle. 

“You've got one breem,” Tripwire said. 

“I won't need that long.” Swindle leaned over the repair platform. “Oh Smokey, are you in trouble again? Shame you've got no friends left, isn't it? Do you know how much you owe me?”

Smokescreen thrashed; Vortex kept watch over the bonds, but they didn't even creak. 

“Fifteen million, five hundred and thirty five thousand eight hundred and forty two credits,” Swindle said. “Let's call it a cool sixteen mil. And that's without interest.” He cupped the Autobot's chin and squeezed. Smokescreen grunted. 

“Sixteen million credits earns a lot of interest over fifty thousand vorns,” Swindle continued. “And you're going to pay it back. All of it. Sure, it'll take you the rest of forever, but you never cut and run, do you? You'll stick around. Partners, wasn't that what you said?”

Tripwire snickered, and the cable joining her to Smokescreen's medical port swayed. Smokescreen's optics widened, no longer focused on Swindle, and his mouth grew wide in a soundless scream. His interface cover drew back, revealing his cables and ports. Tripwire connected them, businesslike all bar the frantic thrumming of her winglets. 

Smokescreen's thrashing increased. He looked to Swindle, then Vortex, then to Tripwire with her iridescent wings and her calm, professional focus. He mouthed words, and Vortex ignored them in favour of the terror in his optics, the dread manifested in his energy field. 

“I'll price you high,” Swindle said. “You're a rarity now, a real live Autobot. You think that's worth sixteen million creds?”

“Over a few thousand vorns,” Vortex commented. “Maybe. Comm me if you need me, I've got scrap to do.”

Swindle nodded, not turning away from Smokescreen. Tripwire didn't respond. 

* * *

First Aid leapt on him the moment he opened the door. 

“I have an idea!" His captive was excited, his engine revving and his armour pleasantly warm as he wrapped his arms and legs around Vortex, evidently expecting to be held. 

"So do I." Vortex nipped his throat and grabbed his aft; he didn't want to disappoint. "You smell good."

First Aid laughed, squirming. "Not that! Well, maybe later..." He leaned back, and Vortex supported him. So trusting, it was beautiful. "I have an idea to help Smokescreen, but I need your help."

Vortex sprawled in the nearest chair, and smoothed his hands over his captive's back. "And?" he said. 

"He's scared of you." First Aid arched into the touch. "He shouldn't be. I need you to keep your distance, just for a few orns. He needs the space. And, um... When you do come to see him, you need to, um... I think he's uncomfortable seeing you touch me."

"But you're so touchable." Especially the curving soft edges of the recess at his back and the angles of his waist. Very nice.

That earnt him a stern look, although it was swiftly followed by a quick apologetic kiss. "He needs time. It's quite an adjustment. Remember when you first found me? It took me a long while to get over my prejudice."

So that's what he was calling it now. "All right," Vortex said. "You're the expert." That earnt him a deeper kiss, and a little wiggle of his captive's highly enticing hips. It was a shame to make him stop. "I have some news."

"Hmm?" Predictably, First Aid ceased all provocative behaviour and gave Vortex a very serious, attentive look. "What's happened?"

"Nothing you need to worry about," Vortex said, his hands stilled on the medic's waist. "It's just, the authorities know about Smokescreen, and they know he's not a drone. We could pretend he'd died and been reformatted, but Onslaught thought the risks were too great." 

First Aid's energy field thrummed with worry. "I'm not sure I understand." 

"Hook came earlier," Vortex said. "The next time you plug into Smokescreen, you'll notice some new software."

The medic froze. "What new software?"

"A behavioural inhibitor." Vortex shrugged. "It's to make sure he won't attack us."

"But he wouldn't!"

"You _don't think_ he would," Vortex said. "But he might. He hurt you yesterday and he didn't even realise it. He's been through a lot, you said so yourself. We don't know what he's capable of. Besides, this is Galvatron's call, not ours. We just gotta roll with it."

First Aid's engine grumbled, but he relaxed again, resting his head on Vortex's shoulder. "I don't like it."

"You and me both," Vortex lied. "But he'll be safer like this. They'll want him branded, but he'll live."

"When did they stop?" 

"Stop what?"

"Killing people." First Aid moved to tessellate his front as well as he could to Vortex's chest. "When did they stop executing prisoners? Was it when they took Blaster?"

Vortex revved his engine, and First Aid seemed to melt into the vibrations. But his little processors were clocking away, and the worry hadn't ebbed from his energy field. "They haven't," Vortex said. "We had to fight to keep him."

"Would you fight for me?"

That was so uncharacteristically selfish that Vortex couldn't help but smile. "To the death," he said. "Only we already started down this road. We reveal you now, we gotta tell Galvatron we lied about you in the first place, and we'd all end up in the smelter." He extended his energy field in rippling slow pulses, reassuring, caring. "You're safe here, remember?"

First Aid nodded, and a tiny shiver passed through him. 

"You like being with me?"

This perked him up. "Of course." He sat upright, the worry morphing to concern for Vortex. "Without you I... I don't know what I'd do. You make it so much more than bearable."

Vortex laughed. "I think that was a compliment?" He tugged First Aid closer, lining up the warmth of their interface covers, enjoying his captive's encouraging responses. "All this hiding," he said, "it isn't forever. You wanna connect?"

First Aid nodded, and kissed him again. 

* * *

Smokescreen didn't know which way was up. First Aid came and went, the ceiling wobbled, the walls shook. His frame rattled, and First Aid connected with him, spoke to him. 

It was a long while before he could make sense of the sounds, and longer still before his short term memory re-engaged and he could remember them, process them, and come up with a response.

But when his mouth opened, it wasn't the words he'd planned that came tumbling out.

"I'm fine, thankyou for asking," First Aid said. He nodded to Smokescreen, his face masked while sparks flew from between his fingers. "I'm almost finished, just three more spots of welding before I can bring your arm back online."

"Feel ill," Smokescreen said, and _yes_ at last! His own words. "Really ill." _Get it out get it out get it out_. But that last part was denied him. His lips quivered, and he couldn't even form the shape of the words. 

First Aid paused in his work, then safely and carefully downed tools. "Do you need to purge?"

Smokescreen nodded. Then began to shake his head as First Aid fetched a clean container and propped him up. "No, not that way..." How could he say this without it triggering the programming. "Data," he rasped. "Data purge."

First Aid looked uncomfortable. 

"Please." Smokescreen bent his head forward, exposing his medical port. _Get it out of me!_

The relief as First Aid connected his diagnostic cable was profound, but short lived. 

"You've recently completed a full defragmentation," First Aid said. "There's nothing to purge."

"What?" How could First Aid have missed it? It was right there, in his central processor. "Please!"

"I know about the add on," First Aid said, and Smokescreen's core went cold. The medic returned to his welding. "Vortex explained it to me. I don't agree with it, but there's nothing I can do."

"No..." Sure there was. He could get rid of it. _Please!_ he tried to say, _Swindle's going to sell me!_ "I understand," the programming spoke through him, and it was all he could do to add, "Still feel sick."

“You're so brave,” First Aid said, and he genuinely seemed to mean it. He hummed, inspecting Smokescreen's elbow. “I think we're all done there.” He met Smokescreen's stare, his optics bright and earnest. “Ordinarily, I'd have you up and about straight away to help with the integration, but I'd like to leave your nanites to work on it for at least two hours before you move.” He put his tools away, and Smokescreen flinched as his arm returned to his sensor net. “I'd like to talk through your treatment plan, if you feel up to it.”

“Treatment plan?” Smokescreen gaped. He'd had his treatment plan. His main repairs were done, his frame was fine; First Aid was just fine tuning him, it was practically cosmetic. 

“You've been through a lot.” The medic took a cloth from the tool rack and began to clean his hands. “I... I saw them kill Rodimus, I've seen a lot of things. You were out there so long... I think it would be wise to begin a course of counselling, to help reduce the potential impact of the past year on your psychological wellbeing.”

“You think I need therapy?” Smokescreen said.

“Yes,” First Aid answered, and his direct honesty prompted a pang of homesickness so intense Smokescreen thought he really would throw up. “I think we both do,” the medic continued. “I think we can help each other.”

He was so practical, so perceptive, and yet so blinkered. Smokescreen shook his head in disbelief. “All right,” he said, and circuits began to activate that he hadn't had cause to use since a good month before the Stunticons brought him to Vortex. This was an opportunity; if he played it right, he could get them both out. “Where do you want to start?”

* * *

_Journal recording 057_

I'm selfish. I couched it in terms of reciprocation because I thought Smokescreen would respond best to that, but I need it too. I need to talk to him. He knows which questions to ask, we can guide each other. We only talked for an hour today, but already I feel lighter. 

I told Vortex, and he seemed pleased if a little jealous. He tried to hide it, I think he perceives his envy as a weakness. I told him how obvious it was, that he had nothing to worry about. 

I showed him, and it felt so right. Afterwards, we watched a flight of new-cast seekers enjoy the freedom of the skies over towards Protihex. It was peaceful, and lasted until his proximity sparked new heat in my frame. 

Sometimes, I wonder where this compulsion to physical gratification comes from. Being with him really is addictive. It isn't just that he's larger than me, or that he's a rotary, although my preferences have always lain in that direction. It isn't just the loneliness and the isolation, either. If it was, I'm sure I would have felt something around the others. 

Perhaps it's a combination of all of those things. Or maybe it's a sign that all is not as bleak as it seems. If we, with our fundamentally different understandings of the universe, with our opposing philosophies and starkly diverse moral codes - if we can find common ground, fondness, love even, after all the horror and the death, then perhaps there's hope after all. 

Vortex seems to believe it. He sees a future where I'm free to come and go. He hasn't said much, probably he's afraid of building my expectations, but it was implicit in his words: _All this hiding, it isn't forever._

I should like to go outside for a drive. One day.

* * *

Vortex left while First Aid was still in recharge. Judging by experience, he had another full joor before the medic would finish his defrag cycle and begin to boot up. It was amazing how valve overloads tired him out. Not right away, but as soon as his systems cycled down, he was off and could get mildly frazzled if Vortex woke him up too soon. 

Perhaps, after paying their newest piece of property a visit, Vortex would find him a present. He was careful to be sparing with his gifts; time and attention were more valuable in the balance of First Aid's regard for him. But sometimes, it did him well to bring his prize a cube of mid grade or a few packets of energon treats. 

One day, perhaps he would enjoy more exotic gifts. 

And thinking of exotic. "You're a mess," Vortex said, and the lock engaged behind him. 

Smokescreen cringed. Evidently Swindle hadn't coded in the appropriate responses yet. 

"Look at you, all dented and scratched." 

"Frag you," Smokescreen spat. He didn't move though, just tugged his limbs in closer to his body.

"That's no way to greet a friend," Vortex said. He perched on the edge of the platform, grabbing Smokescreen's arm as he tried to turn away. "Activate behavioural pattern six alpha point two."

Smokescreen's optics flared in panic, but his limbs relaxed. "Please don't," he said, and it could equally have come from the Autobot himself as from the instructions coded by Swindle.

Vortex treated himself to a tour of the Autobot's bodywork. All dented and scratched it may be, but there was potential. Life too, thrumming strong through his armour. 

"I don't want this," Smokescreen said, and that was clearly the programming because his knees parted just a little. "Please don't hurt me."

"I won't hurt you," Vortex said, sliding a hand between Smokescreen's thighs. "Swindle owes me, and you owe Swindle. It all balances out."

Smokescreen shook his head. "Please no..." 

"You're heating up nicely," Vortex commented. "Release your covers. There, yes, very warm. Dry, but warm. I think I'd prefer your spike. I don't get spiked that much nowadays. I'm sure you understand."

"Please..." It came out as a strangled moan, more the programming than any deft handling on Vortex's part. His spike extended, though, battered and scratched, just like the rest of him.

"Hasn't Aid fixed you up yet?" Vortex pinched the tip, and Smokescreen winced. "Or maybe this is how you always look. Tell me." He sprang onto the bunk, straddling the Autobot. "How long did the Stunticons keep you before they decided to pass you on?"

Smokescreen's response was beautiful. His optics failed, his engine stalled. The programming kept his fans alive, but Vortex was sure that the clenched fists and gritted denta were entirely his own. 

"Good bot," Vortex said. "Did they fix up your valve, or did Motormaster figure he was above spiking someone so weak and pitiful?" He drew back his own cover and eased himself down onto the spike. "Mmmm, that's not a criticism of you, you understand. It's just a fact. Motormaster has standards." 

"Get off me!" Smokescreen yelled, but it was - as programmed - entirely at odds with his behaviour. His aft bucked, and a little energy flared from his spike. Vortex lay over him and rolled his hips, drawing the spike over his nodes in exactly the way he liked. 

"Swindle needs to have you repainted," he said, resting his weight on Smokescreen's hood. "Who's going to want to buy you like this? End behavioural program." 

Smokescreen wailed, but he didn't struggle. He went limp, and turned his head away. Vortex rode him to climax, loudly expressing every moment of his enjoyment. Eventually he came to a stop, his rotors shivering and vents working a little harder than usual. 

"It's like you're already dead," Vortex mused. "Activate completion sequence." He tightened his valve, squeezing Smokescreen's spike; the Autobot overloaded with a horrified cry. "You could easily be dead," Vortex continued. "You should be grateful." He sprawled over Smokescreen, enjoying the gentle tickle of the residual charge. "Hey, look at me when I'm talking to you." He tapped the Autobot's face.

Smokescreen glared at him, hateful and thoroughly miserable. But he kept his mouth shut.

"All your friends are dead." Vortex yawned. "All of your comrades. You owe us your life. All of it. There's only Aid left, and you're going to be the perfect patient for him. We'll get someone else to deal with your-" He squeezed again, eliciting a sad little whine. "-equipment. I don't think he should be exposed to that, do you?" 

Smokescreen's face contorted. "Go leap in a smelter!"

"Be nice," Vortex said mildly. "I can make life worth living or... I can make you wish you were already dead."

"Too late," Smokescreen said, but it didn't ring true. 

Vortex stroked his cheek. "Wanna bet?"

* * *

_Journal recording 058_

My second session with Smokescreen didn't go as well as the first. He kept mentioning Vortex, and asking if I was all right. That question only has one answer right now: I'm fine. But he kept pushing, as though I was hiding something. 

"I really am fine," I told him. "As fine as I can be." I couldn't help but think of Rodimus and Arcee, Silverbolt stripped of his wings. 

"You don't look fine," Smokescreen said. 

"We _lost the war_." I've never felt as low as that moment. "I... I'm sorry, I didn't mean it to come out that way."

"Where were you?" Smokescreen asked. I must have looked confused because he continued. "You saw Rodimus die, you told me. Where were you?"

"Two floors up from here," I replied. It was a struggle to pull myself together. "In my room. I couldn't get out."

"Why not?" 

"Vortex locked me in, he didn't want me to get hurt."

Smokescreen became agitated. He began to ask about Vortex. No, not ask, to demand. It was quite distressing. I answered everything honestly, of course, but I know how bad it looked. 

"You're a prisoner," Smokescreen said. "Switch on your logic circuits and you'll see it. You should-" But I never got to find out what I 'should'. Swindle turned up, looking polished and cheerful. I was relieved to see Smokescreen relax. 

"I've come to see the patient," Swindle said, and I caught the scent of his polish, he'd certainly made an effort. “Do you mind if...?” 

Smokescreen sighed, laying back like I'd been trying to get him to all session. It was so good to see the tension ease. 

Swindle's hint, however, had struck home. I made my apologies, pretending I needed something from medbay downstairs, and left them to it. 

When I returned, Swindle had gone, and Smokescreen was lying still, his head turned to the wall. 

"I've had enough, I want to recharge," was all he said, so I helped him. I'll need to speak with Swindle, if his visits are this exhausting he needs to keep them to a minimum. 

* * *

Smokescreen woke abruptly, dragged up through layers of nightmare into the harsh cool light of the medical cell. Swindle was there, and as soon as his processor registered the fact, his frame went limp, his mind dulled. It didn't stop the memory of hands on and in his body, whispered calculations, a clinical inspection of his worth. 

“He's coming around,” Swindle said, and Smokescreen looked up. A purple blur filled the doorway. He forced his optics to recalibrate, and his engine choked. Cyclonus.

“I can see that,” Cyclonus said quietly. “Autobot, can you hear me?”

“Huh?” Smokescreen shook his head. He needed a missile, a bomb, something to take that piece of scrap out of commission once and for all. He didn't have the strength to raise his arm. 

“Activate behavioural sub-routine alpha two,” Swindle said. “Smokey, answer the question.”

“Yes,” Smokescreen said, and it was terrifying how readily the programming made him respond.

“Good,” Cyclonus said. “I have some news for you. You were separated from a pro-independence human terrorist unit approximately four orns ago. I will not ask you if that's correct, I know it is. The Autobot sniper Chromia remained with the unit.”

Smokescreen stared. He didn't like where this was going.

“The humans began to show signs of severe radiation poisoning approximately two orns ago. Fourteen joors later, they began to die.”

Swindle smirked. Smokescreen wanted to tear his stupid smug face off.

Cyclonus continued. “Five joors ago, we attempted to apprehend Chromia. You may be pleased to know she died a warrior's death.”

“No...” Smokescreen tried to roll himself off the platform. If he could just stand up, he could reach the tool rack, he could grab something and launch himself at Cyclonus. 

“Lay still,” Swindle said. “There's a good bot.”

“You are alone,” Cyclonus stated. “Your faction is gone, your cause is dead, and rightfully so.”

Smokescreen strained against the programming. “You're lying,” he spat. “You can't know... She's alive and you're scared-”

“We _know_ ,” Cyclonus said. “After your capture, Soundwave traced your movements back via footage from the surveillance drones. It's how we located Chromia.”

“Don't fight it,” Swindle whispered. “You won't win.”

“We also know that you've had no contact with any other terrorist cells, human or Autobot, for over fifteen orns.” Cyclonus' optics narrowed, and he folded his massive arms over his chest. “You _are_ alone,” he said. “There is no need for us to execute you, you pose no threat. But you do have value. As part of the conditions of ownership, Swindle will give you over to government use for two planetary rotations out of every orn. Your continued good treatment will rely on your full co-operation.”

Good treatment? Was Cyclonus insane? But Smokescreen hadn't the chance to reply. Swindle spoke the code to put him back into recharge, and the waking nightmare dissolved in a sea of more nebulous horrors. 

* * *

_Journal recording 059_

I've done something terrible. 

I didn't mean to, oh scrap I really didn't mean to. But I've done it and... I can't imagine the consequences. I'm shaking so hard I rattle. Where's Vortex? He should be here. Have they arrested him? Oh no no no no, this can't be happening, I... I need to get somewhere safe. 

* * *

_Journal recording 060_

I'm in the closet in medbay. They'll find me, I know they will, but where else can I go?

Cyclonus is here. He saw me. I wasn't prepared. 

I think he knows.

I'm going to be sick.

* * *

_Journal recording 061_

I can't find Vortex. I don't know if they've taken him away. Swindle is here, but there are Sweeps, I can't get to him. Brawl's out with Onslaught, Blast Off's... somewhere. I don't know. 

I keep thinking they'll come for me. They'll find me. I... Vortex broke the law, I can't imagine what they'll do to him. 

I tried his comm. I know it's for emergencies, but this feels like an emergency. He didn't answer. 

Oh scrap, the way Cyclonus looked at me. He stared, he... He knows, I'm sure of it. Onslaught knew, Swindle knew. I'm no good at being a drone. I wasn't prepared, this is all my fault. 

Vortex, where are you?

* * *

_Journal recording 062_

Swindle called my name. 

The Sweeps are coming for me.

* * *

_Journal recording 063_

Cyclonus knows. 

He hasn't said much, I think he's angry. He's gone now, but the Sweeps are outside. We're leaving soon. 

I've abandoned all pretence. I no longer matter. But Smokescreen... his repairs aren't complete, his therapy, we've only just begun. I need to see him. I tried to tell the Sweeps, but they won't listen. 

They've locked Blades in here with me, I don't know why. He's offline now, but I keep looking at his dents and scrapes, seeing patterns I don't want to see. Pock marks from shrapnel. Dents from the impact as he hit the floor. A crumpled echo of a shock wave in his armour from the shot that tore Defensor apart. Scorch marks on his chest. 

It was Cyclonus who killed him. 

I'm so scared. 

* * *

One of the major benefits of having Swindle in the team was that Vortex hardly ever had to pay for anything any more. Even the drinks he 'bought' for the excitable new-builds who poured into Swindle's club went on a tab, and Vortex never saw the bill. 

It didn't mean Swindle was happy with the arrangement, but with Smokescreen to make a small fortune from, he couldn't really complain. 

Vortex relaxed in Swindle's private booth, watching the Prime-a-like drones gyrate and writhe around one of the new-built soldiers. Tripwire lay across the opposite seat, a worshipful neutral in her lap, feeding her drips of high grade from his slim, blunt fingers. 

It'd be a while before Vortex could bring his captive anywhere like this, but the thought was entertaining. First Aid would probably heat up in abject embarrassment, and try to hide his face against Vortex's shoulder like he usually did when he couldn't work out what to do with his arousal. 

Vortex was sure he could chip away at the medic's inhibitions.

He drained the slightly bitter dregs of his second cocktail and contemplated a third. He wasn't on duty for another joor, and First Aid would be busy with Smokescreen. There was time to kick back and watch that new-build get ridiculously steamed between the pair of identical drones. 

A commotion at the door failed to grab his attention. 

One of the drones dropped to its knees, encouraging the new-build to take out credit to pay for the next option on the menu. Vortex grinned, and raised his cube to summon the waitbot.

A hand landed on his shoulder. Long fingers, glossy red claws. A long, metallic moustache and pair of sharp crimson optics appeared in his field of vision. “Lord Galvatron summons you,” Scourge said, and it was only when Vortex stood that he realised exactly how inebriated he was. 

* * *

_Journal recording 064_

I'm in some kind of holding cell. A pair of Sweeps stands outside. They look bored. I can't stop shaking. I channel my worry to Smokescreen. What will happen to him if the Combaticons are executed? I don't want to think about it. 

I try not to think about what will happen to me. It will be painful, I know. But it can't last forever. And afterwards, I'll be with my brothers. 

I shouldn't be so afraid to die. 

* * *

Thinking through the overcharge wouldn't have been too tricky, were it not for the energon cuffs. Galvatron had a line in abject humiliation that was thoroughly hilarious provided, Vortex thought, it wasn't happening to you. 

And look, there was Brawl, similarly cuffed and giving every impression he was about to blow a gasket. Onslaught was calmer, and Swindle didn't look at all concerned despite the solid glowing rings around his wrists. Only Blast Off was missing, and frag knew where he was. 

Vortex tried to access the team bond, but even his pre-programmed responses were muzzy, and besides, the energon cuffs were pressing against his rotor hub in a very distracting way. 

Behind him, a small audience gathered. It wasn't exactly a spectator sport, watching Galvatron pass judgement. Audience participation was frequently demanded, and could be fatal. Vortex tried not to laugh, but it was just too funny. That, and the vibration from the cuffs coming through his output shaft to tickle his engine. 

Cyclonus stepped onto the dais. “All kneel before Lord Galvatron!” 

Vortex heard the clatter as several dozen pairs of knees hit the floor. Galvatron stalked in, and here Vortex tried to pay attention. Galvatron was never easy to predict. Sometimes a mech could laugh in his face and receive nothing worse than a slap on the back, and sometimes even the most servile of sycophantic snivelling would lead to a smoking black crater in the thick metal of the floor. 

Galvatron took his place in the throne on the dais, and Cyclonus stood beside him. There were charges. There were always charges. Vortex had lost count of how many times he'd been hauled up by the authorities, and had stupid lists of misdemeanours read to him by sanctimonious exhaust pipes with sense of humour failures. 

Cyclonus certainly couldn't be accused of having a sense of humour, at least not one Vortex thought was funny. Galvatron, on the other hand...

“...conspiracy to hoard a significant resource, and prevent its use by the state.” Cyclonus glared, and the words finally filtered into Vortex's drink-slow processors. First Aid had been discovered. 

The Autobot appeared at a side door, guided by a pair of Sweeps. Whispers broke out; this was news. Vortex fought to remain still. 

First Aid was docile, moving slowly, not looking at his captors. They hadn't bothered to chain him, but paraded him in front of Galvatron by jostling his shoulders. He didn't resist. He did catch sight of Vortex, and his visor flared, but the Sweeps didn't let him pause, and pushed him until he faced the other way. 

Galvatron levelled his cannon in the direction of Vortex and his team. “You sought to conceal the Autobot Chief Medical Officer from me?”

The team bond lit up, and Vortex winced. Onslaught was taking command. 

But First Aid slipped out from between the Sweeps and threw himself in front of the cannon. “It wasn't their fault!” he cried. “It was me. They thought I had processor damage. I faked the readings when they scanned me. They didn't know.”

“What is this?” Galvatron snarled. “Are you telling me that the Combaticon interrogator can't tell the difference between a drone and a sentient mech playing make believe?”

Vortex slumped. He could see Onslaught's mind ticking over, measuring the problem, deciding how exactly he could transfer the heat away from himself and Swindle and Brawl. 

“No,” First Aid said. He glanced at the cannon's muzzle and shivered, but stood his ground. “I... Please.” He glanced back, and every mech in the room would have had to have been blind not to notice who he was looking at. Great. “Please,” First Aid repeated. “I know it was selfish, and I know we broke the law, but the Quintessons would have killed me. They saved me.” He looked to Cyclonus, and his shivering was such that it was a miracle his voice rang clear. “You called me a resource. You wouldn't have this resource if it wasn't for them.”

Galvatron rolled his optics skywards and gave a dismissive wave of his cannon arm. “Cyclonus, this is hardly entertaining. Put them in solitary, I will say when they are released. Reassign the _resource_ as you see fit.”

Vortex offered no resistance as a Sweep hauled him to his feet. He could deal with solitary. He'd been through worse. 

* * *

_Journal recording 065_

I'm not dead. 

A lot's happened in the last forty two hours, but I'm not dead. 

I don't know how I feel about that. 

Life is full of things I don't know.

Vortex is in prison. I don't know when he's getting out, and whether he'll even want to see me again after what happened. He was so good to me, and this is his reward? First I insult him by accident, and then he gets locked up. I tried to comm him, but they've put a block on his signal.

I've been assigned a room in an accommodation block beside the new central administration building. I don't know how long I'll be there. It's spacious enough, with a drop-down bunk, a computer console, and a small window onto a public square. 

I miss the tower and Vortex's room, and the windows. I miss being up high. 

I can't see the factories from here, but I can smell them if I go outside. I went down to the square about an hour ago. My guard kept close. She's a new-build, a tall flier with wide blue wings. 

Her name is Aerofoil, and she didn't let anybody talk to me. I don't know why.

Perhaps I should have died. It's not fair that I get to see Cybertron rebuilt and my brothers never did. 

Homesickness is a constant ache, but I can't decide where I want to go: Earth or my makeshift medbay in Combaticon HQ. 

* * *

_Journal recording 066_

Today, Aerofoil took me to Smokescreen. 

He's in a military hospital a few blocks from my new home. He has a cell to himself with his own pair of guards. He isn't allowed to communicate with the other patients. 

The look on his face when he saw me. His eyes lit up, and he smiled. He actually _smiled_. 

“Looks like I'm your doctor again,” I said, but my voice shattered and I don't think Aerofoil knew where to look because I couldn't help but cling to him. I was so scared he'd been forgotten, though I kept telling them to get him, that he couldn't lay in that room by himself until Galvatron let Swindle out of prison. 

“Have they reassigned you yet?” Smokescreen asked. He didn't let me go, and I was so pleased to feel how the strength had returned to his arms. “Please tell me they're not sending you off-world.”

I shook my head, and my mask clattered on his hood. I patted his shoulder and sat up. “Why would they do that?”

“You're a resource,” Smokescreen said. “We're both resources. I'm giving tactical advice or some scrap. You're the best field medic I've ever seen. You were the _CMO_. Just don't let them send you to Earth.”

His tone was so serious it gave me chills. “Why?” I asked. 

“Just don't,” he said. “Earth... It's not like it used to be.”

“The bombs?” I said. “Vortex told me-”

“Bombs,” Smokescreen agreed, and he seemed to be choosing his words carefully. “And other things. Is he still locked up?”

I wish he hadn't asked. “I don't know,” I said. 

“Yes,” Aerofoil said. She bit her lip, apparently embarrassed at having interrupted. 

“Oh.” I couldn't work out if that was good or not. He was in prison, which I didn't want him to be, but a thoroughly selfish part of me was pleased to have a reason that he hadn't got in touch. 

“Aid?” Smokescreen squeezed my hand. “Look at me. You know you're in a strong position, don't you?”

I shook my head.

“You were the chief medical officer, you had the power to over-rule the Prime. Scrap, I even saw you give Ultra Magnus a dressing down once. I've seen you rescue soldiers from the front line under enemy fire, and put mechs back together under conditions that'd make any regular medic run for the hills. You have skills most people only dream of, and you've got the experience to back it up.”

“I'm not the only medic on Cybertron,” I said.

“You're not hearing me,” Smokescreen said. “You're not just a medic, you're... you were one of the highest ranking Autobot officers. I know you never really set any store by that, but you can't forget it. They _need_ your skills; they need your expertise. Don't let them tell you where you get assigned. You make a choice, you tell _them_ where you want to go. You can negotiate.”

“I'm no good at negotiation.”

“You're putting obstacles in your own way.” Smokescreen sighed. “Get out of Kaon. Go to Polyhex or Kalis, anywhere they're rebuilding, it doesn't matter, just do it before Vortex gets out of jail.”

“But I don't-”

“ _Think about it_ ,” Smokescreen said. He was getting agitated, like he had before when he asked about Vortex. “He's been manipulating you. He's not all... sweetness and light, whatever you think he is. He doesn't care about you, you're just a toy to him, and he's got you eating out of his hand.”

“You don't understand,” I said, and it was difficult to keep my temper. “I don't expect you to understand. I value your advice, but on this you're wrong.”

“At least think about it,” Smokescreen said. “Promise me. He kept you prisoner, he hurt...” He grabbed his helm, his denta gritted. But the pain seemed to pass quickly, leaving him restless. “I don't want you to get hurt,” he said. “He's done it before. He's a fragging case study in the clinical psychology datafiles. Read the case notes, I know you've got them in your databanks.”

“I have read them,” I said, and I'm ashamed to say I was a little brusque with him. “This is _different_. People can change. All those... incidents, they were before the Detention Centre.”

“No,” Smokescreen said firmly. “You're not seeing the parallels.”

“You're not seeing the differences! He didn't approach me, _I_ approached him!”

“Only after he locked you up for months on end in complete isolation.”

“I would have died!” I must have raised my voice because Aerofoil coughed and gave me a pointed look. 

I was instantly ashamed, I couldn't apologise enough. Smokescreen was wrong, but he's my patient and my friend, and there I was yelling at him. He didn't deserve it, and Aerofoil didn't deserve to be forced to witness it. 

“It's OK,” Smokescreen said. “I just want to make sure you'll be all right.”

I just hugged him again. I can't make promises like that, not knowing if Vortex will forgive me, or even if I'll make it through the next week without breaking down.

* * *

The single benefit to solitary confinement was that it gave Vortex time to think. 

He didn't dwell on the _should have been_ s. He'd played his role perfectly, his only mistake had been in dropping his vigilance around the base. No, he needed to start with what he had, and calculate the best route to where he wanted to be. 

First Aid had done well, despite his accidental insult to Vortex's intelligence. His little display at the sentencing marked him out as Vortex's property, and only the suicidal and terminally stupid would go after him. That is, if Cyclonus hadn't locked him up.

That could be an issue. One of many. There were dozens of potential barriers to Vortex getting his way, and he used the quiet time in solitary to run simulations on them all. 

It was easiest when he couldn't hear Swindle calculating out loud through the walls, or Onslaught talking Brawl down from yet another escape attempt. 

Vortex lay on his front on the floor of his cell, spinning his rotors to generate a little noise, and continued to plot.

* * *

It was too much to hope that Swindle wouldn't come back for him. 

Smokescreen paced his room, wearing in his new joints, testing his mobility. Inside his thigh, coiled around the largest strut, was a length of wire. Under his hood, glued to the casing of his headlight, was a laser torch. A small collection of First Aid's tools, stolen during his incarceration at the Combaticon base, weighed oddly in secret parts of him. 

Swindle would come back for him, and when he did, Smokescreen would be ready. 

* * *

_Journal recording 066_

Cyclonus will see me tomorrow. 

I don't hate him. It was war; I've been through this with Vortex dozens of times. I think I might have processed at least that part. I will never forget my team, and I will never cease to wish that we could be safe and well together, but I don't hate Cyclonus for what he did. I forgive him. 

This morning, I asked Aerofoil about Blades... I mean the drone made of his body. I want him – _it_ \- to be safe. She says that Blast Off has charge of Combaticon HQ and isn't letting anyone in. 

At least they didn't throw him in prison.

I need to go, Aerofoil says I can visit Smokescreen again.

* * *

First Aid still wasn't getting it. Smokescreen sighed and let his head flop onto the foam support of the bunk. Vortex truly had done a number on him. But for all that it _was_ worth another argument – and another argument was certainly brewing if they kept on that subject – it wasn't the only thing he wanted First Aid to think about.

“I used to be in business with Swindle,” Smokescreen said. The inhibitor programming didn't activate; the past was safe ground. “It's not common knowledge.”

First Aid nodded. “Vortex told me you knew each other.” He retrieved a tin of the kind of polish meant to stimulate self-repair nanites, and popped the lid. By the door, the blue femme perked up, her orange optics curious. Smokescreen had almost forgotten she was there. 

“We ran scams,” he continued. “Fraud, usually, investment opportunities that were never going to work out, sales of land on uninhabitable planets.” 

First Aid covered his shock well. He was always best at not reacting when his hands were busy. “Why?” he asked. 

“To make money,” Smokescreen said. “For the thrill. I won't lie, it was exciting.”

First Aid nodded, making the kind of non-judgemental sound of encouragement that came straight from his core programming. 

“We were good, and we got greedy. We made our way up the social scale, targeting higher and higher status marks: senators, famous racers, the kind of towers mechs who owned a tower not just lived in one.” Smokescreen paused while First Aid propped up his legs, letting him reach the backs. “We thought we could get away with anything.”

“But you couldn't,” First Aid said.

“No,” Smokescreen agreed. “The deal fell through, the fraud investigation unit at Iacon was onto us. We fragged up. It was like this massive bubble burst, and fifteen and a half million credits just vanished into thin air.” He raised his leg, slowly so the tool strapped to his leg strut wouldn't clatter and give itself away. “We had a contingency plan, but I couldn't make it. I got arrested. They brought Swindle in the next day. He'd been waiting for me where I was meant to meet him, but I hadn't shown up. We made a new plan, whispering between the cells that night, but... it never worked out. I had friends in places Swindle couldn't even dream of. They paid my bribes, they got me out.”

“But not Swindle?” First Aid slowed, the cloth following the same circle. “You got out because the system was corrupt?”

Smokescreen shrugged. “That's how it worked back then. And no, not Swindle. Just me. They put him away, gave him twenty vorns. When he got out, first thing he did was try to kill me.”

“But... He's...” First Aid's hands stopped moving completely. “He can't blame you, it wasn't your fault. He must have forgotten about that by now.”

Smokescreen held the medic's eye. “No, he hasn't,” he said, but it was all the programming allowed him. 

“I don't understand.”

“He always was vindictive.” Smokescreen spoke carefully. “He never ever lets go of a grudge.”

“But...” First Aid's vocaliser failed, and his visor flickered. “But you seemed so happy when he came to see you.”

“I can't talk about that,” Smokescreen said. 

First Aid stared. “Why not? I don't understand. Vortex wouldn't have let Swindle see you if-”

“Vortex does a lot of things you wouldn't like.”

“What's going on?” First Aid pleaded, but Aerofoil stepped forward. 

“Time's up,” she said. 

* * *

_Journal recording 067_

Every time I think the ground is stable, it shifts beneath my feet. 

Smokescreen has made allegations. I don't want to believe them, but I have to believe _him_. If we don't trust each other with difficult truths, who can we trust?

Aerofoil took me back to my assigned room. I want to go back to Combaticon HQ. Blast Off would let me in, I'm sure. But Aerofoil isn't allowed to take me anywhere save the public square and the hospital. 

I keep going over Smokescreen's words. Swindle holds grudges. Swindle blames him for the loss of millions of credits. But it was aeons ago! No-one could stay angry that long. 

Vortex has done things I wouldn't approve of. Recent things. It fits his profile, but it doesn't fit my experience of him.

No, I'm wrong. It does. 

There was the battle. After Rodimus died, after Silverbolt and Arcee and Springer, when the smoke covered everything. I saw him flying in and out of the pall, keeping low. Doing things I wouldn't approve of.

I want to go home. I want to get Blades and hack into the security net, and I want to see for myself what Swindle is like when I'm not around. What Vortex does and doesn't do. 

I feel awful for doubting them, but even worse for doubting Smokescreen. 

* * *

“Enjoy your vacation?” Blast Off said. 

“Frag you.” Vortex splayed his rotors in a gesture the shuttle couldn't fail to interpret as obscene, and checked his ammo. “The only reason you weren't in there with us is you were in space and Galvatron's got a worse attention span than Brawl.”

Brawl bellowed his disagreement, but Onslaught caught him before he could throw a punch. 

“Silence, all of you.” Their commander was not pleased. “And keep quiet. I don't want to hear another word that isn't directly related to this mission until we get back.” He was calm, for now, but they all knew it wouldn't last. Vortex only hoped they could keep a lid on it until they reached R46Jaxus20, or whatever the slagforsaken organic scrapheap was they'd been sent to. 

Blast Off transformed, and they climbed aboard. Onslaught and Brawl sat up front. Swindle had been relegated to the cargo hold with Vortex. He glowered, but he was wise enough not to glower directly at the interrogator. 

It was going to be a fun forty joors. 

* * *

_Journal recording 068_

Rewind is alive.

I still can't believe it. He's alive and he's working for the media network. 

He filmed my meeting with Cyclonus, and... what came after. I wasn't prepared, and Rewind being there, it just threw me off. 

I remember offering my services as a medic if they would put me to use among the neutrals; I could make a difference, I could help with reconstruction. I remember running hot and cold, and feeling dizzy and like the floor was moving even though I was already sitting down. 

“That would be a poor use of resources,” Cyclonus said. It was strange to see him seated, and behind something as everyday and un-warlike as a desk. Even stranger to hear him speak gently. “Lord Galvatron wishes you to take the brand. You will serve as his personal physician, and will be accorded the respect and privileges due to your rank. Any free time you have, you may apply your skills at your own discretion in our military installations. This does not preclude you taking civilian patients. Is that acceptable?”

“Take the brand?” I felt slow-clocked. “I'm not a soldier.”

“No,” Cyclonus said, “you _were_ a soldier, regardless your personal feelings on the matter. Now, you are a peacemaker.”

I couldn't argue with that. I just stared at him. 

“You will take the brand, and show the galaxy that Cybertron is ready to move on. The war for our planet is over, but there are other conflicts, there will be new challenges. Our lord invests a great deal of trust in you; your agreement to his terms will go a considerable way to ensuring a lasting peace for Cybertron.”

They didn't sound like Galvatron's terms. Suddenly, I had a new appreciation for the Decepticons. These were Cyclonus's terms. Galvatron had told him to deploy me as he saw fit, and this was his plan. 

I tried to see a flaw in it, but he was looking at me, and all I could see were the benefits. I could practice again, out in the open. I could treat civilian patients. I could work for a lasting peace. 

As I spoke my agreement, I couldn't help but think that this mech had robbed me of my brothers, and yet here he was offering me the chance to rebuild my life. 

* * *

_Journal recording 069_

My shoulder itches. The brand went deep.

The itching shows that the nanites have got to work. The brand will heal to purple, once the nanites have done their job. Right now it's an angry kind of grey.

Have I betrayed my heritage? I was built an Autobot, but unlike so many others, I wasn't built for war, but in anticipation of peace. Wheeljack didn't design me to be a pacifist, I decided that by myself. I wonder if he would have approved?

Today was Cyclonus' day, much as the media tried to make it mine. This brand is his victory. My old insignia is still there; it's strange, Rewind wasn't allowed to keep his. Perhaps this is another of Cyclonus' engineered symbolic gestures. 

Rewind isn't branded at all. He works alongside Rumble and Soundwave, and I've seen him emerge from Soundwave's compartment. I have no idea if he's happy. 

I'll try to find out. 

They told me Vortex is out of prison. He's off-world, doing his part for the Decepticon cause according to the Sweeps. I wonder if he's anywhere he can receive Soundwave's broadcasts. Did he see me stand in front of Galvatron with my head bowed while Cyclonus took a hold of my shoulder to steady me, while he pushed the glowing white brand through my paint and into my metal?

Did Smokescreen?

I think of Smokescreen, and something occurs to me that I should have thought of as soon as Cyclonus made his offer to me. Why haven't I been issued with a behavioural inhibitor?

* * *

_Journal recording 070_

Aerofoil is still assigned to me, but her status changed the moment I rose from the dais. She's my bodyguard now. My assistant, if I need. She has the programming, although it's never been activated. She's only two months old, but she's strong and intelligent and, even if she isn't kind she has the capacity for it. She just needs to grow. 

I asked her to take me to Smokescreen, and she did so without comment or question. 

“You negotiated,” he said, as soon as he saw me.

I nodded. Aerofoil closed the door for me, but this time she put herself on the other side. 

“What did you get?”

“Another chance to live,” I replied. “The opportunity to use my skills. How are you feeling?”

“Fine,” Smokescreen said, and I couldn't tell whether he was just putting a brave face on it. Then I noticed something new, a computer sitting alongside the machine that monitored his energon consumption and EM activity. 

“What's that?” I asked. 

“My new console,” Smokescreen said. “They've got me running simulations on some defensive stuff.”

“Oh. Uh...” I glanced at the door, half expecting Aerofoil to still be standing there. “Smokescreen... They didn't issue me with inhibitor software. I know you have it, Vortex told me, remember? But I don't.”

Smokescreen seemed to freeze. Then he shuffled on his doorwings, and shrugged. 

“Why?” I demanded. But it wasn't him I should have been asking. 

“I'm tired,” he said. “I think I need to recharge now.” 

Oh Sigma, why didn't I see it before? His optics had glazed, his jaw was tight. His fists balled by his side, and I should have known. I should have seen this and diagnosed it, and done something about it. 

“I'm so sorry,” I said. “You can't talk about it, can you?” And what else had he been programmed to keep quiet about? I felt like purging. I sat on the edge of his bunk, and he grabbed my hand while my fans spun like crazy and the nausea slowly passed. “I'm so sorry, I'm so so sorry.” I couldn't stop apologising. Swindle had done this to him, and Vortex had lied about it. He'd lied to me. About Smokescreen. 

What else had he lied to me about?

“Lower your firewalls,” I said. I was dizzy, still, but I couldn't leave him that way. I would take any consequences.

I didn't have the chance. Just as I was about to plug in Aerofoil opened the door. “You've been summoned.” 

* * *

“Just ask him.” Vortex leaned on the wall by the nurse's station, watching Swindle fill out Smokescreen's release forms. “All that talk about us 'criminal glitches', it's just hot air. I've seen the way he looks at you. He sent you Smokescreen...”

“I don't need your advice,” Swindle said. 

“That's why you're getting laid,” Vortex said. “No, wait, you're not. Fragit, Swin, he's young, he doesn't know up from down, you could talk him in circles until his head explodes.” 

Swindle huffed and wiped the screen. He started again. “Shut _up_.” 

“He revs your engine...”

“And Cyclonus is gonna let me talk to him after Torqulon,” Swindle muttered. “Yeah.” He turned to Vortex. “Why are you here again?” 

“I'm helping you collect your property,” Vortex said. 

“Hoping yours will show up, more like,” Swindle said, focusing again on the forms. “Face it, you lost him.”

Vortex flicked his rotors and headed for the elevator. It took Swindle a few astroseconds to realise he was gone, and then the only thing that followed him was a stream of expletives over his internal comms. 

No-one barred his way to Smokescreen's room. He didn't knock, just in case the Autobot was doing something worth seeing. 

“Relieving a bit of pressure?” he whispered. 

Smokescreen near enough fell off the bunk. His armour snapped shut and he gripped the padding hard. “Get away from me.”

“Like that's gonna happen. We've come to take you home, won't that be nice? Swindle's filling out the forms.” He leaned in close, amused to spot a dribble of oil on the Autobot's hip. “I might treat myself to another freebie, you were so accommodating last time. And it's not like Swindle's going to want you. He's got his greedy little optics on Motormaster.”

“I said shut up, Tex.” Swindle pushed through the doorway. “You can walk now?” He gave Smokescreen a quick visual assessment. “Good. Let's go.”

* * *

_Journal recording 070_

Galvatron is far from easy. He doesn't like medics. He doesn't like being repaired. He kicks and snaps and complains, and discharges his weapon into the ceiling when he thinks I'm being unfair. Even the smallest tasks take so long. 

I'm beginning to realise why this isn't a job for the Constructicons. 

I'm so tired. I need to go back to Smokescreen, but I can't leave. Galvatron's repairs are only half complete. Cyclonus is talking him down, convincing him to let me back in. I'm going to try to recharge on the couch. Aerofoil can wake me when Galvatron comes around. 

* * *

Vortex spun on his chair, waiting for the security feeds to load. 

On a secondary screen, the footage of First Aid's branding played on a loop. It was a pretty piece of propaganda, scripted and edited and broadcast to the galaxy as a mark of how far Cybertron had come. 

Something for the neutrals, Vortex thought. And the surviving Autobots, wherever they were. 

It might bring a few of them out of the shadows. 

While he waited, Vortex tried First Aid's comm. Unavailable. Just like the last six times he'd called. 

At least he hadn't been blocked. 

His high level security clearance had been restored too. Although he was beginning to suspect his connection was being throttled, the speed was so slow. 

He watched the branding again, tracking First Aid's responses, seeing how he dealt with the stress, the fear. It can't have been easy, and it was such a shame Vortex hadn't been there to take charge of him afterwards. 

He kicked the base of the console. Swindle was wrong, he hadn't lost his prize. The terrain had changed, that was all. His objectives were still the same. 

The feeds finally loaded and he kicked the console again, this time in triumph. Now, to locate his target and plan his next move. 

* * *

Smokescreen wasn't ready.

Two joors of forced recharge in Combaticon HQ, and they were off again. A drive through Dead End, a meandering route in the grimy dark. No headlights, Swindle didn't want to be seen. The ground was rough, and every chunk of debris, every pot-hole and gnarled knot of corrosion jolted Smokescreen to his struts. His secret cargo of tools shifted and clattered, and he could only be grateful that these were the least of the noises they were making. 

Swindle led him through an old parking lot and into the back of a shabby acid-pocked building that looked like it might once have been a shop. A mech was waiting for them; an old model lacking faction symbol, but with brand new null rays mounted on his arms. He set on Smokescreen as soon as he transformed, sluicing him clean of the ever-present Kaon grime.

Smokescreen flinched from the solvent and the old mech's touch. His hidden tools weighed heavy, but not as heavy as the past few months. If only Swindle had given him a breem alone and conscious. That's all he'd needed; he could have been ready. 

But he wasn't, and there was no telling when he'd next have the opportunity to use those tools. 

“The house always wins,” Swindle stated.

The neutral looked up. He gave Smokescreen another blast with the hose, then slunk off into an adjacent room. 

“Don't tell me you've forgotten.” Swindle circled him, that calculating half-smirk on his face. “You used to play them so well, all those alphas and the new-money technocrats, the aliens.”

Smokescreen glared at the middle distance. He wasn't compelled to respond, so Swindle could suck slag if he wanted a reply. 

“You remember how it works,” Swindle continued. “Tonight, you're going to run a game.” He poked Smokescreen in the side, then produced a cloth and wiped over a small area of his waist. “You'll let the players choose the game. And if they wanna escalate it, however they wanna escalate it, you'll go right along with that. Activate behavioural program beta nine. Do you understand?”

“Yes, sir,” Smokescreen answered with no possibility that he could stop himself. 

Swindle snapped the end of the cloth over Smokescreen's hip, and began to inspect his front. “No less than fifteen percent beginners luck in the first half joor of any round,” he said, “reducing to a five percent chance of a moderate win over the rest of the game. Winnings aren't to amount to more than eighteen percent of the overall takings.”

“Yes, sir,” Smokescreen said. 

“And I want you smiling,” Swindle said. “Not like that, like you're enjoying yourself. Yeah, that's better.” He ran the cloth over Smokescreen's hood, and all Smokescreen could do was grin. “All right,” he said. “You're ready. Show time.”

* * *

Vortex relaxed in First Aid's small apartment. There was no high grade, he'd checked, but the chairs were comfortable enough and there were a few energon goodies in a jar to the side of the recharge alcove. Vortex chewed on them while he waited. 

It had been easy enough, once he'd found out where First Aid was staying, to locate and hack the building's maintenance drone. He wasn't banned from approaching his former captive, and wasn't worried about appearing on camera, but he didn't want to risk a confrontation with First Aid's guard. From what he could tell, Aerofoil took her job seriously, and had already seen off several mechs who'd got too close. 

Vortex couldn't blame them for trying, although he'd have sent them away with worse than missing limbs and a broken chassis. And hunted them down afterwards. Actually, there was a thought worth following up. 

The door lock pinged, and the display flashed green. Vortex sunk down further into the chair, keeping himself out of view in case Aerofoil chanced to look in. She never entered the apartment, Vortex knew from the security logs, but she always waited in the corridor until First Aid was safely inside. 

Oh scrap, the medic looked good. Exhausted, sure, but so thoroughly fine that Vortex had a struggle to keep himself in the chair. Of course, First Aid had to dally on the threshold, thanking Aerofoil for her constant vigilance, making sure there was nothing by way of maintenance that she needed.

Finally, First Aid backed away from the door. It closed, the lock engaging automatically, and he slumped. He leant on the door, his vents slow and deep, his visor dim. Such an intimate moment, and Vortex kept quiet until First Aid again went to move. 

“You look like you could do with a drink,” Vortex said. 

First Aid startled with a cry, his back clanging against the wall. “How did... I mean where... I... I didn't know you were back.” 

It was an impressive recovery. “But you knew I'd gone,” Vortex commented. “You wanna sit down? I'll fix you a drink.”

First Aid complied in a shaky nervous kind of way, and Vortex fetched some of the mid-grade from the blast-proof storage recess. 

“You've been busy,” he said, handing over the cube. He settled on his knees by First Aid's chair, and suppressed a shiver as their energy fields instantly meshed.

The medic's optics flickered, and he tried to detract from it by taking a long slow sip of the fuel. But his expression when his mask rolled back was beautifully conflicted. “I owe you an apology,” he said. “What I said to Galvatron, I didn't think through the implications. I realise now how insulting it sounded, and I'm sorry.”

Vortex acknowledged him with a solemn nod. First Aid had scripted that, he was sure of it. How long had he spent agonising over the wording, making sure his apology was just right? 

First Aid put the energon on a ledge to the side of the chair. “What did they do to you?” he asked. 

Vortex shrugged. “Solitary,” he said. “Been through worse.”

“Still.” First Aid bit his lip. The glimpses of internal conflict were tantalising.

“You oughta finish your drink,” Vortex said. “Then maybe I could give you a nice, slow polish.” He leaned forward, gently flaring his energy field. 

First Aid made an undignified and thoroughly charming sound, and rebooted his optics. “No,” he said in a strangled whisper.

“No?” This wasn't going to plan. 

“No,” First Aid repeated more firmly. He vented deep. “Vortex, we need to talk.”

This _really_ wasn't going to plan. “About?” Vortex prompted, remaining exactly where he was. 

“You lied to me,” First Aid said. “About Smokescreen. I think it would be best if you sat over there for now.”

Vortex threw himself into the room's other chair, not caring that his rotors bent. “Sure I lied,” he said, as though it was the obvious option. “The truth wouldn't have done you frag all good.”

“That wasn't your call to make,” First Aid said. He huddled in on himself, hands clasped in his lap. “I trusted you, and you betrayed that trust.”

“It was for your own good,” Vortex countered. “I told you about the inhibitor.”

First Aid glared at him. “You told me it was standard. It isn't. Rewind doesn't have it. _I_ don't have it.”

“Rewind was reformatted,” Vortex said. “You didn't know that, did you?”

First Aid ignored the hook. “You led me to believe that Swindle would treat Smokescreen kindly. But he won't, will he? He has an agenda of revenge; I can't condone that. Smokescreen will remain in the infirmary under my care, Swindle isn't taking him anywhere.”

“He already has,” Vortex said. “There, that was the truth and you didn't like it. Oh for frag sake, sit down. You think Aerofoil's gonna let you storm HQ?”

First Aid stopped with his hand inches from the lock. 

“He doesn't need rescuing,” Vortex said. “And you couldn't if you tried, so don't try.”

“But he's with Swindle,” First Aid said quietly. “He... I can't stand by and let Swindle hurt him.”

“You really think Swin would do that?” Vortex flicked his rotors against the seatback. “You've known him almost as long as you've known me. Do you really think he's that cruel?”

Vortex knew it was the wrong question as soon as he'd asked it. 

First Aid tensed. “Yes,” he said. “During the war, when he took Metroplex's transformation cog, he showed himself to be that cruel, and if you don't believe it then I think you're deluding yourself.”

“Tomorrow,” Vortex said, “I'll take you to see Smokescreen. How about it?”

First Aid shook his head and sighed. “All right,” he said at length, then he hit the door panel. The door slid open. “I need you to leave now.”

“You don't want me to,” Vortex said. 

“I need you to leave now,” First Aid repeated.

“OK.” Vortex did as he was told, making sure their energy fields again touched before he crossed the threshold. “Tomorrow, I'll come find you.”

For a moment, Vortex was sure First Aid would relent, that he'd leap into his arms and provide him the warm welcome Vortex so richly deserved. But the medic's obstinacy was truly impressive. “Goodnight,” First Aid said, and closed the door.

* * *

_Journal recording 071_

I want him. Oh Sigma, so help me I want him, and I shouldn't. But seeing him here, having him close enough to touch... 

I need to remind myself that he's manipulating me. I don't suspect it, I _know_ it, he told me so. He lied to me, he said it was for my own good.

 _For my own good_ ; what does that even mean?

I can't settle. If he got in once, he can get in again. And scrap, but there's a part of me that wants him to. If he came back now, I don't know if I could turn him away. 

I want him back. 

This is so selfish. 

Smokescreen is out there. He's out there with Swindle and I should be out there trying to get him back. I was made to protect, but here I am pacing my apartment, trying to drink my energon and settle my tank and stop my processors from spinning, and Smokescreen could be going through anything it all. I can't stop it, I can't even make sure he's OK. 

I can see him tomorrow, but what use is that? Anything could have happened by tomorrow. 

I know the logical course of action. I'm going to put myself in forced recharge; I owe it to Smokescreen not to be a nervous wreck whatever tomorrow may bring. 

* * *

Smokescreen dug his fingers into the desk. A large grounder fucked him roughly from behind, one massive hand wrapped around his neck, forcing him down. 

The grounder had wanted him raw and resisting. Swindle had relaxed the controls and Smokescreen was free to scream and yell and tense all he liked. But his valve still ran moist to protect his delicate components, and his gears still turned. 

He focused on the muffled hum of voices, the thud of music. Swindle's bar was directly below, and the glowing neon sign of a rival shone brightly through the open window. 

Swindle was probably back in his booth, counting out his credits. Smokescreen had played the new-builds well, unable to do anything else. Then the older mechs had assembled, and real money began to move. They'd held an auction, and the winner had groped for Smokescreen's panels in full public view before Swindle had insisted they move upstairs. 

It wasn't for Smokescreen's benefit. He thought about Swindle, the transaction, the tools welded to the inside of his armour. Anything but the hulking Decepticon groundframe coming to a violent shuddering climax inside him. 

The groundframe held still for a moment, then pulled out and left without a word. 

“Messy.” 

It took Smokescreen a while to work out that it wasn't Swindle come back to claim him. As the door slid shut, he realised that perhaps he should have been more alert. 

He turned over on the desk, limbs weak. “Speak for yourself,” he snapped. 

Vortex shrugged. He was pink to the elbows, little drips falling from his tail rotors. “You owe me an explanation.”

“Frag you,” Smokescreen spat. He clung dizzy to the desk, and opened his mouth to hurl more invectives simply because he could. But he never got that far. Vortex hauled him from the desk and slammed him into the floor. 

“Activate beta nine,” Vortex snarled, and sat heavily over his legs. “Hook us up.”

Smokescreen's arms reached for their hardware before his conscious mind had registered the command. A low fuel warning pinged, and his vision began to glitch. Vortex's energy field was as much a mess as his armour, pulsing wildly, a savage tangle of lust and hate and anger. 

The interface was worse. 

“Lower your firewalls,” Vortex snapped, and Smokescreen cringed as his defences evaporated and Vortex went straight for his databanks. “What did you tell him? _Show me_.”

The intensity was appalling. Smokescreen was ripped back through the past day, two days; his conversations with First Aid played over and over. Not just their final talk in the hospital, but every conversation they had ever had. In Combaticon HQ, on Earth, on Cybertron before the end of this gruesome, bitter war. 

Close up, Smokescreen could see clear liquids among the pink, could feel it sliming his armour and seeping into his seams. 

What had Vortex done?

No sooner had he thought the question than the answer came, as immersive and cruel and vindictive as the interface. 

A neutral flier from the foundry sector; a snapshot of him approaching First Aid, a security vid from the infirmary. A shot of Aid's blue guardian taking him away. Then a blur of envious loathing, a new view of the mech propping up some slagforsaken bar with the heat of the smelting pits radiating through the walls. Reflection of red in his yellow visor, spatter of pink on a filthy wall. Vortex had connected to kill him, relishing the agony, the terror; loving the hot burn of a dying laser core in his hands. 

The moment of death was a rushing chill that blazed as fierce as the final flare of the neutral's laser core. Vortex moaned and squeezed Smokescreen's shoulders, lost for a moment in the memory. Then a roar of frustration as the echo of that death failed to induce in him a repetition of the climax he had experienced at the time. 

Vortex shuffled back, nudging Smokescreen's thighs apart. Smokescreen was unable to wince. The programming forced him to tilt his hips and moan in feigned pleasure as Vortex slammed inside him. 

The cool fluids quickly warmed, the nodes sparked. Smokescreen had no way to disconnect, no way to force himself to purge, body and programming, he was stuck. 

Vortex's sudden triumph was sickening. He slowed his pace, leaning down and smearing the dead mech's energon over Smokescreen's cheek. He slipped two fingertips into Smokescreen's mouth. “Suck,” he demanded. “Taste him. Think how easily that could be you.”

The dead fuel was sour, tainted by old oil. But Smokescreen could no sooner stop himself than he could stop Vortex from rifling through his memories.

“You're a piece of work,” Vortex marvelled, and for a moment there was a clear thread of admiration before the charge crashed through everything and Vortex whispered, “Activate completion.”

Smokescreen's valve shuddered, sore and aching. His spike discharged beneath his armour. Vortex whispered the command again, and again. Each climax was weaker than the last, each left Smokescreen nauseated, drained, weakened. The humiliation burned him like acid. 

“I bet you won't go through with it,” Vortex whispered, pressing his spike as deep as it would go. He hooked his fingers around Smokescreen's lower denta and tugged his head forward. “I bet you'll choose the coward's way out. I bet you'll hide behind the programming and tell yourself you don't have a choice. And I'll come see you every single cycle from now until the day you rust, and I'll make sure you know exactly why you're still here.”

Another pulse of loathing, and Vortex tore his cable free. Then he ripped his fingers from Smokescreen's mouth and dug around under his hood. Smokescreen hardly felt the glue give way, but Vortex held up the small adjustable wrench he'd stolen from First Aid, and his core went cold. 

Vortex threw it on the floor beside him. “Pathetic.”

Smokescreen's vision fizzled out, and he never saw Vortex leave. 

* * *

Vortex accelerated hard, tearing through clouds as sickly yellow as the light from The Easy Mark. He could have killed Smokescreen. He'd wanted to. He almost turned back, but the fury blazed hot and there was no way Swindle would let him in a second time. 

Deep down, a part of him counselled caution. Smokescreen was about to prove himself useful, he just had to wait. 

He didn't want to listen. Better to turn his anger out. He called up his file on the neutrals who had approached First Aid. One down, four to go.

* * *

Swindle's bar never closed, but there was a lull at 14:00 joors when the shifts changed and the club temporarily emptied. The gaudy drones went into stasis in Swindle's booth, and the only newcomer made Smokescreen want to purge. 

Motormaster stalked in as though he owned the place. He looked around, a disgusted sneer on his face, located Swindle, and made straight for him. 

The Combaticon knocked back yet another concentrated high grade shot, and slapped Smokescreen on the shoulder. 

“Upstairs, refuel, get some recharge. _Go_.” 

Smokescreen moved as fast as he could force his aching dented frame. Just the sight of Motormaster made his lines run cold and his joints want to seize. But the Stunticon paid him no attention, and it began to occur to Smokescreen that he was about to get that breem of alone time he so sorely needed. 

The waitbot shoved a cube of high grade in his hands as he neared the stairs, and he paused. Motormaster had joined Swindle in his booth and Swindle virtually fell into his lap. 

Smokescreen took the stairs at a run. This was his chance.

He chugged the energon, and reeled as the rush hit. Then he hauled the door shut and began to open up his armour. Motormaster deserved what was coming to him. Swindle too. And the rest of them. With any luck, he could take out the entire city. 

Vortex had been wrong; Smokescreen wasn't clinging to life, he wasn't afraid to die. He was just waiting for the right opportunity. Maybe Vortex would understand, before the shock wave tore him apart and the heat of the blast turned his metal to vapour. 

First Aid would also die, but what future did he have here, enslaved to Galvatron, with Vortex shadowing his every step?

It would be a gift, clean and quick. A death he wouldn't see coming. Smokescreen could take him back to his brothers, and they would all be together in the Matrix.

Downstairs, the music thudded on. Smokescreen uncoiled his scavenged copper wire, and lit the stolen laser scalpel. 

* * *

_Journal recording 072_

I dreamed in defrag. Defensor told me secrets he had never known, things Vortex whispered to me in the cosy warmth of our recharge cycles in Combaticon HQ. 

I can't stop thinking about him. I dreamed fragments of memory, the ghost of our time together eclipsing even the ghost of Defensor. 

Vortex will be here soon, and I'll have to guard myself every moment. I want to touch him, to be held by him. I want... I _crave_ physical reassurance, but that's not what I need. Not after he lied to me. Not before I see Smokescreen and can gauge the depth of his deceit. 

* * *

Aerofoil had mixed feelings concerning the grey and teal rotary. On the one hand, he was a Decepticon, a veteran, it was in her base programming to respect the sacrifices he and others had made to secure Cybertron in their name. 

But he wasn't just a soldier. Everything about him screamed predator, from the way that he moved and spoke to the way he studied First Aid when the medic appeared in the door to greet him. He was controlled, purposeful. His body language was possessive, and although he never actually made a move to touch the medic, it was obvious that Vortex was hunting him. Aerofoil wasn't sure that she liked it. 

She was, however, sure that it was none of her business; First Aid wasn't her prisoner any more, he was merely under her physical protection. It would have chafed – an airframe of her class and skillset should see active combat, not be stuck on Cybertron minding a defector – but Aid had been appointed Lord Galvatron's personal physician. If she built a good service record with him, perhaps she could win a position in Galvatron's elite guard. 

Keeping her optics on the opposite wall, she listened to Vortex's careful compliments, and the quiet, almost regretful, responses. 

“Aerofoil,” First Aid said softly. He shot Vortex a look that was full of longing, and Aerofoil had the impression she was about to be ordered back to her room to give them some privacy. But he straightened up and reset his vocaliser. “Vortex has offered to take me to see Smokescreen,” he said. “I hope that doesn't go against your orders.”

“Not at all,” Aerofoil said. “Although your duty lies first and foremost to Lord Galvatron. If he summons you...”

“We understand,” First Aid said. 

* * *

First Aid insisted on walking. Vortex was fine with that; it gave him the opportunity to stay close, the chance to talk. It didn't hurt that it also demonstrated his ownership of the ex-Autobot to the city at large. Aerofoil followed several paces behind, good cyberpuppy.

With any luck, Smokescreen was already dead. Lying tragically broken in a pool of his own energon, the tool that had taken his life still in his hand. 

Vortex had seen it all before; prisoners who tore off sections of their own armour to make a blade, who broke vital connections and severed lines, and died a quiet sad death with no-one to save them. 

He'd know as soon as Swindle did, but his team mate was busy, cut off from their bond. Riding Motormaster's spike, no doubt, those pretty purple optics sparkling and the Stunticon's large hands guiding his aft. 

“Why is everything so spread out?” First Aid asked. He stuck close to Vortex, veering away from the deeper shadows as they passed through an area that was virtually unlit. 

“All the best buildings went first,” Vortex replied. “Claims went up for empty lots before Cyclonus formed the committees. There was no central planning, it was everyone for himself.”

“Where _is_ Smokescreen?” First Aid said. 

“Swindle's got a bar, Smokey's working there.”

This earnt Vortex a piercing glare. “As what?” First Aid said. 

“Croupier,” Vortex replied. “I know you don't like gambling, but Smokescreen does, and he's good at it.” 

“That's... how he's paying Swindle back?”

“Sure,” Vortex said. “Cyclonus gets him for that strategic planning scrap every orn, but when he's not doing that, he's free to work off his debts.” 

“Just a croupier?” First Aid pressed. They emerged onto a street with better lighting, and the medic put a tiny bit of distance between them. It wasn't as much as before. 

“Well, croupier, scammer, confidence trickster, whatever you wanna call it.” Vortex scanned the surrounding buildings, bringing his lasers online in case any lurking empties wanted to offer themselves up as an example of Vortex's protective devotion. “Mechs know what they're getting themselves in for. They could win, they'll probably lose, up to them if they think the risk's worth taking.”

“And Smokescreen's doing this of his own free will?” First Aid was tenacious. 

“No,” Vortex replied. “But it's either that or prison.”

First Aid gave a solemn nod. It clearly wasn't approval, but he was coming to terms with the harsher realities. Good. 

Swindle was still blocked from the bond as the neon glow of that little cluster of bars began to shine through the dark of the dormant city. A harsh flare of light was all the warning Vortex got. 

He powered up his thrusters, seizing First Aid and slamming them both into the recess of a doorway. First Aid struggled, panicked, but Vortex held him still, pinned between himself and the solid ancient alloys of old Kaon. 

The shock wave hit a fraction of an astrosecond before the fireball. The building rocked, and Vortex's rotors were swept painfully back from his hub. A moment of exquisite agony as the air boiled around them, then another impact, Aerofoil bowling into them from behind. 

And below it all, a constant wail of hurt confusion; Swindle screamed through the reopened team bond. 

“It's over,” Aerofoil said, but Vortex ignored her. 

“Swindle's hurt.” He grabbed First Aid's helm, and fought to get his attention. Swindle was more than hurt. Frag Smokescreen; Vortex should have taken him apart. “Swindle needs you. Acknowledge.” 

“Smokescreen,” Aid said, and with a surprising burst of strength wrenched himself free. He sprinted for the burning bar, and Vortex followed. Swindle was in there, under... something. The team bond sparked to life, chatter on his comms. Blast Off ETA twenty astroseconds, Brawl was on board. 

The heat was intense, but their armour could bear it even if their tubes and connectors and all the non-metallic components essential to their continued existence would only stand up to it a short while. 

Vortex reached the medic in time to haul him to a stop before the broken upper story of the building collapsed. It did so slowly, old girders half melted and drooping, then solidifying into new shapes. Old seams split and all the organic paraphernalia of Swindle's club still burned. 

“Let me go!” First Aid writhed. Vortex considered keeping him. They could wait for Blast Off, only ten astroseconds away and closing. But it carried echoes of that final battle, the death of Rodimus Prime and all those worthless lives First Aid held dear. Vortex couldn't afford to hold him back, not this time. He let the medic go, and Aerofoil dived in after him. 

Above them, Blast Off disgorged Brawl mid-air and transformed, landing in the glowing hot centre of the building. He heaved away a section of wall. 

“Here!” he yelled, his impatience and disgust as clear in his voice as they were in the bond. Vortex went in with Brawl, and together they brought Swindle out. 

Their palms burned, and Brawl grunted as the sensors popped and died. Swindle's face was slack, his optics shattered. They laid him slowly on a patch of cooler ground. Blast Off deposited Motormaster beside him, then calmly began to uncouple his own armour. He unclipped a section of his atmospheric re-entry system and doused the smaller mech with coolant. 

Vortex caught sight of Aerofoil, First Aid close at her heels. In her scorched and soot-streaked arms was nothing more than a random collection of parts. If Vortex unfocused his optics, the smallish lump at the end bore passing resemblance to a head. 

“Set him down, gently,” First Aid said. “Before the heat gets to your lines.” He dropped to the ground beside Swindle in a fog of steam. Back in the burning club, the final wall gave way. 

* * *

_Journal recording 073_

Swindle's going to live. His recovery's progressing well. He needed replacements for most of his external parts, but his basic framework was fine and his alloys gave adequate protection to his personality component and databanks. 

Motormaster escaped with minimal damage. He's returned to the Stunticons, I doubt I'll see him again in the infirmary. 

It's a tragedy that, of the handful of people in the bar when Smokescreen tried to take his own life, only Motormaster and Swindle escaped with injuries they could recover from. 

Smokescreen isn't going to recover. 

The death toll was two. The bartender and another staff member. They were in a back room when it happened. Perhaps Blast Off could have reached them, but I understand that his concern for Swindle would have over-ridden anything else. 

Smokescreen lost over ten percent of his personality component, and fifty percent of his databanks. He clings to life, not strong, only stable. I keep hoping he'll wake up, but it's been a week already. 

I monitor his vital signs – remotely, most of the time. Galvatron is quite demanding. I see Smokescreen when I can. 

I've given him optics, a fuel pump, a body as similar to his old one as I can possible make. 

It hasn't helped him to wake up. Sometimes, I don't think he's going to. 

I don't think he would have wanted to.

He caused the explosion. The neutrals held an inquest – they do that now, part of Cyclonus' drive for civilian participation in the reconstruction of Cybertron. They found what I suspected when I first saw him. Smokescreen had fabricated a weakness in his own laser core. He'd turned himself into a bomb. 

We're so lucky. He could have destroyed most of Kaon. But he didn't disable the fail-safe properly.

Vortex says it's better if he never wakes up. If he comes online, they'll put him on trial, he'll be executed as a traitor or a terrorist. 

Vortex is a constant presence. He waits for me in Smokescreen's ward; he'll be there in my apartment when I get home, or he'll let himself in during my recharge cycle and be sitting patiently in his chair when I wake up, just reading or watching my vid-screen with the volume turned down. 

He tells me it's too small here for me, and I should move back to Combaticon HQ. It's so tempting, although not for the reasons he gives. I want to see Blades again, I want the view from the tower. I want my makeshift medbay. I want it to be easy again; I want an excuse to break down the barriers I've made, much as I know it's a bad idea. 

I'm beginning to rely on him again. If I ever truly stopped.

I haven't touched him since he held me back to keep me safe as Swindle's bar collapsed; I miss the physical contact so much it hurts. 

But I can't change the fact that he lied to me about Smokescreen. That he stalks me, no matter how good his intentions. That he lets himself into my home without permission, and thinks he's better placed to make decisions about my physical and psychological well-being than I am. 

That is hardly a healthy basis for a relationship. 

* * *

_Journal recording 074_

Two weeks have passed and still no change. 

Smokescreen subsists on life support; Vortex is my shadow.

He tells me about the Detention Centre, locked in his processor unable to see or feel or taste or touch. He looks at Smokescreen, and tells me if it ever happened to him, if he was reduced again to nothing more than his thoughts rattling around in his mind, he wouldn't want to live. 

* * *

_Journal recording 075_

One month. Smokescreen lies in stasis while the Quintessons invade Earth. I remain in Kaon, making soldiers again of the wounded. Galvatron thinks I'm too weak for the front lines, Cyclonus thinks I'm too valuable a resource. 

The gestalts have all gone. Vortex calls me daily, his signal routed through the same space bridge that floods us with wounded and takes away the repaired. 

He won't tell me what's happening, but I can see it on the media feeds. Sharkticons by their thousands, a field of devastation. They're in Johannesburg, New York, Beijing; I know by the few human buildings left standing. Everything is white, a layer of ash I almost mistook for snow, but this is nuclear winter and I can't see a single living tree or blade of grass. 

A part of me is grateful that Smokescreen isn't awake to see this.

* * *

_Journal recording 076_

This is all so familiar. The uncontrollable shivering, the helpless dread. I requisitioned the drone made from my dead brother to have another pair of hands in the hospital. 

Rewind came under my care today. Vortex was telling the truth, he's been reformatted and his databanks replaced.

That could so easily have happened to me. 

Vortex told me it wouldn't, he said my experience is invaluable. 

I said, “And Rewind's wasn't?”

* * *

_Journal recording 077_

The war drags on. No humans have come through the space bridge. I don't know if I'm grateful or not. 

Scrap, that sounds so selfish. 

They'd die here, of pollutants, rogue nanites, radiation. I don't know if it's worse than what they'd suffer back on Earth. 

Rewind has returned to Soundwave. Smokescreen lingers. Vortex has stopped asking for his status. 

I can't recharge without the drone. 

* * *

_Journal recording 078_

The Quintessons are here. If it wasn't for the space bridge, we would all be dead. 

The walls shake constantly with the echo of explosions. Aerofoil guards the hospital; she has her own unit now, and one of her finials is broken. She wears the damage as a badge of honour. 

I feel as though there's an extra pane of glass between me and the outside world. Not like another visor, more like a window or the side of a box. I answer questions without hearing what I'm saying; I schedule treatment via my base programming for hours on end, and perform surgery on automatic while my mind wanders.

Defensor's talking to me again. Fragments of phrases my brothers would say, a snatch of conversation between himself and Superion.

There's always a trigger, something that puts me in mind of a scene we've experienced before. _I've_ experienced before. 

I don't think Smokescreen is getting out of this. 

* * *

_Journal recording 079_

There's a media blackout. The building still shakes, but I don't know who's dropping the bombs and which side they're dropping them on. 

I continue with repairs; there's nothing else to do.

* * *

_Journal recording 080_

The bombing stopped about an hour ago. I don't know what that means. 

Defensor does. He has words of wisdom for me. 

_Prepare for the worst, and hope for the best._

I can't let Smokescreen get captured. He's been through so much. Too much. And it occurs to me to wonder: is it torture for him? Is he awake like Vortex in the Detention Centre, trapped and frightened and unable to get out no matter how hard he tries? By keeping him alive, am I really doing what is best?

I've brought Bla... the drone to Smokescreen's room. The windows have blast shutters, dented with shrapnel. I can't see out, and I'm not sure I want to. 

Defensor reminds me who I am, his voice and Hot Spot's words: _Protectobots, transform and combine!_

I can't. My brothers are dead, I'm the last of my gestalt. The words circle like Sharkticons, and I wonder if it wouldn't be best to end this here and now for the both of us. 

The lights flicker and die, and in the eerie gloom of the emergency illumination, Blades' pocked white armour looks grey, his dark offline visor could so easily be red. 

_Protect_ , Defensor insists. I am to do my duty. 

I take Smokescreen's head in my hands and unscrew the back plate. I lean close and whisper to him that I'm sorry, that there's nothing else I can do. That this is the only dignity I can possibly give him now, the only mercy. That I love him, and I will never let him be forgotten. 

* * *

Vortex found his property in the infirmary's long stay ward. 

First Aid sat on the floor with his back to the wall, no telling how long he'd been there. The Blades drone stood over him, guard or mourner Vortex didn't know. In his hands, First Aid held the fragments of Smokescreen's personality component and his damaged databanks. There was no life left in in the Praxian's frame.

Vortex joined him on the floor, just as battered as the heliformer drone. First Aid clung to him. 

“We won,” Vortex said. “For now. The Quints have gone.” He paused, and plucked a sliver of Smokescreen's cybernetic brain from the medic's hands. “You did the right thing,” he said. And now, with Smokescreen gone, he could pick up the task of moulding the lone Protectobot in his own image. 

“Doesn't feel like it,” First Aid said softly. 

After a while, Vortex stood, and lifted the medic to his feet. “Are you ready to come home now?” he asked.

First Aid leaned heavily against him. When he spoke, his voice was a quiet, defeated sigh. “Yes.”


End file.
